The Walker Family

A week of firsts

2012-01-29T21:31:00.000-05:00

There have been a lot of firsts this week in the Walker household!
First, Maddie has been learning how to read lately! She is doing great and can sound out many words on her own. She loves to read and to try out new books. We are so proud of her! So, the other night, she was working very hard on a secret project. This is what it was! She sounded out the words on the envelope “To My Family” all by herself. Even though it’s not spelled exactly correct, she did spell it how it sounds which I think is great! And she colored the Strawberry shortcake doll (she always colors so carefully like this and includes lots of details and colors) and she cut it out all by herself. It was so sweet when she presented it to us!

And speaking of writing, Abigail wrote her first letter this week! It was the letter A of course for Abby. She has been learning so much at preschool and I think she finally has all of her shapes and colors down. So this week, I started to show her how to write the letter A after she was watching Maddie write letters and wanted to try herself. She caught on pretty quick!

Corinny continues to learn new things almost every day it seems!
She is a pro at crawling now and can get wherever she wants. We have to constantly remind the girls about closing the gate b/c we have found her near the top of the stairs more than once! So tonight I laid her down for bed and after a while she was crying. So I went in and found her like this! I guess she figured out how to pull up to standing! This baby is growing up too fast!!

She has also started to “remember” things. The other day, Brandon was flipping her upside down for fun. Later in the day, Brandon picked her up and she started tilting her head way back b/c she remembered and wanted him to do it again! And now she will also “play shy” with strangers. She lays her head on my shoulder like she is shy, but then will still give them a big grin. I love it!
She loves her sisters so much and they are always entertaining her. Sammi was the one providing entertainment this afternoon and it was so cute watching her laugh with her.

And finally, Sammi went to her first dance! She went with the only man that is allowed in her life right now, Daddy! It was the girl scouts Sweetheart Father Daught Dance. She had such a blast with Daddy and her friends and apparently danced and danced and danced! I’m glad they got to have such a special night together.

January Updates

2012-01-21T15:22:00.000-05:00

We’ve had a great start to 2012 so far!

First, Corinny……

This week she started crawling!

She has been so close for week and so frustrated, so this pleased her very much.

She also LOVES to stand and can stand while holding on to something for pretty long. The other day, she actually pushed her walker! Maddie loves to be her number one cheerleader.

Today, when I went in to get her from her nap, I found her like this. She managed to figure out how to sit up from laying down! I’m sure it won’t be long before I find her standing in her crib when I go in.

She also loves to eat! I try to give her some sort of solid food at least once a day. Often it is just something from what we are having for dinner. She does pretty well with table food and she has had various things from bread and peas to even a little bit of chicken pot pie! She also loves the purees, especially yogurt and prunes. And she can sort of feed herself baby yogurt melts and puffies. She would probably eat a lot more table and baby food if I had the time to give it to her!

Sammi and Maddie also took the free ice skating lessons at North Park. This week will be their last lesson. They both love the lessons and did great. It was so awesome to see Maddie, the same girl who just stood against the wall the whole time at dance camp, just jump onto the ice with no hesitation and join her class. We are so proud of her! And of course Sammi loves it too and it was fun to watch them skate together for free skate after the lesson.

Corinne had her first experience in the snow about a week ago when it snowed just a little. She seemed to react the same way she reacts to anything new we do to her which is she just goes with the flow. She didn’t cry or get upset, but she wasn’t smiling or laughing either! Just kind of like, "whatever”. ha ha.

Oh and Abby now loves the snow too!! She HATED it last year and wouldn’t even go near it. But, this year she got excited about it and had been waiting to make snow angels for weeks and weeks. She was SO thrilled when she got to make one! Silly girl!

Today we had 4-5 inches of snow. The girls played “star wars” together all morning (no, it’s not always barbies and princesses here! although, Princess Leia was involved) and then Brandon took them out in the snow for about an hour. I just took Corinne out for a tiny bit mostly to get a picture. It’s not quite the same without Ashley out there chasing snow balls, but still lots of fun! Such a great Saturday!!

Christmas!

2011-12-31T10:36:00.001-05:00

We are having such a nice Christmas Holiday! Brandon was able to take off this whole week, so we have been doing some fun things together.

Here is Christmas Eve before church. They were all SO excited about Christmas! Sammi was a speaking angel in the pageant they did at church and Abby was a sheep. They both enjoyed doing that and it was very cute and well done.

After church, we had some friends over for dinner and had a surprise visit from Santa himself! The girls were so excited and couldn’t believe he came to their house early and gave them each a gift.

Sammi of course was all about him, and Abby was a little hesitant but did sit on his lap. Maddie was too scared, but she liked him from the other side of the room. And Corinne seemed to like him!

Here they are leaving out milk and cookies for Santa after he left to go make all his rounds.

Christmas morning with 4 little girls was everything you would expect it to be!! Lots of giggles and smiles and fun.

We opened our Santa gifts and stockings and the girls all got want they wanted. I think everyone got a Barbie toy and the big gift was the Kinect for our xbox. We have ALL been having a lot fun with that!

After Santa gifts, we went to the little local church that we sometimes go to. The girls like to go there because they have this Pirate ship for the kids to climb on in the basement. When we got there, we found out we were the only ones there besides the Pastor and Deacon. 2 more people did show up later, but Sammi was all worried because there was no Sunday School and she thought she would just be SO bored with no one else there. Well, she ended up getting to do one of the readings, which she was thrilled about, and I played piano for 2 hymns and it turned out to be a really nice, fun service that we were all involved in!

After church, my family came over and we did gifts with them which was fun as always. Corinne loved playing with her new snail. It has a mirror on the front and can roll. It’s probably her favorite new thing.

So, Monday we had a nice day just staying home and relaxing. It was so nice to not have to do anything and the kids got to play with all their new toys. Tuesday, Sammi and Abby had their yearly well visits. Sammi gained 11 pounds this year!! She is finally catching up to her peers and is is now 53 lbs. (51%) and 47 inches (36%). Abby, on the other hand, is on the small side. She was 29 lbs. (28%) and 34 inches which is only the 3rd %! So she is our little short stack. Thankfully, both are very healthy and neither needed shots!

On Wednesday, our friends Kylee, Ben, Camden, JuJu and Alena who were in the area visiting family came to hang out with us! JuJu is almost the same age as Abby and she walked in with the exact same Barbie car that Abby got for Christmas. So, they were instant buddies! The kids all had fun playing at our house and then we went out to MadMex for lunch to meet another friend. So that was fun! My battery died on my camera, so I’ll have to steal Kylee’s photos later!

Thursday, we went to see our brand new niece, Izabella! Oh she is so tiny and precious!! That was a wonderful day.

And Friday, I got to stay home and do some work in my pajamas all day while Brandon took the girls to the movies. Today, Brandon and I get to go on a lunch date and tomorrow we’ll celebrate the New Year at my parents. Monday, we have plans to go to the museum and see the lights at Hartwood. Then, our long, wonderful Christmas break will finally be over. We have been so blessed this Holiday season and it was so wonderful to have Brandon and the girls home for such a long break!

6 months!

2011-12-31T10:07:00.001-05:00

I'm so behind in posting!!! Here Corinne is 7 months today and I never posted about her turning 6 months! She continues to be SUCH a sweet little baby. She sleeps good and really only cries if she is hungry or tired or if one of her sisters is smothering her again. They mean well, but they can often go overboard with the attention they give her, especially Abby. We have to watch her like a hawk!

My friend Kat took some great pictures of her for her 6 month birthday. These are just 2 of my favorites.

So anyways, at 6 months, Corinne learned how to get around by rolling both ways across the floor. We had to get the baby gate out b/c she would end up on the other side of the room within seconds. And there are stairs that go down from the living room that would be very easy for her to fall down. She also started doing this planking thing! She is SO strong, especially in her legs! Her doctor kept saying how “toned” she was at her checkup! ha ha!

And she is trying so hard to crawl. Probably because her sisters always end up moving her toys out of her reach!

She is such a squirmy worm, perhaps even more so than Sammi, which is hard to imagine. She is constantly moving and is very hard to hold on your lap! Every once in a while she’ll give me a snuggle, but they aren’t often. She is just too busy! She managed to squirm out of her pajamas the one morning and I happened to catch her giving me a “Maddie” look while trying to get a picture!

So at her checkup, Corinne was 15 lbs. 1oz. and 25 inches. I think that was around the 20% for both. She is very healthy and like I said, her doctor couldn’t get over how strong she is!

She has also been trying some new foods. When I have time, I give her baby food and so far she has liked everything I have given her. We also tried these new things called baby Mum Mums. I guess they are some kind of rice cakes that dissolve quickly. She seems to like those and of course had her usual audience whenever she tries anything new.

She often makes this face when eating, like she still isn’t sure what all this new stuff is. But, then she keeps eating it, so I guess she likes it! She also tried the Gerber puffs this past week and I was surprised that she could actually pick them up with the pincher grasp and get them into her mouth! However, after doing that a few times, I held one out to her in my hand and she must have thought picking it up was too much work. So, she leaned forward and just licked it off my hand! ha! She has such a personality!

Sammi choir

2011-11-28T20:18:00.000-05:00

Sammi has joined the Children's Choir at church. So far she loves it! Here is a video of the song they did this Sunday. They sing during the service once a month.

Sitter

2011-11-18T10:04:00.001-05:00

Corinne has been a “taco” sitter for awhile, where she could sit by leaning forward with her hands in front of her. You know, like a taco. Well, overnight it seems we went from taco sitter to real sitter! So here she is, at 5 1/2 months sitting up all on her own! She still topples over after a while, so if I need to leave the room, I try to get one of her sisters to sit with her. But, every day she is sitting for longer periods without toppling. She is very excited about her new trick and often if I try to lay her down, she cries and tries to sit back up. It looks like she is doing crunches. ha ha.

Such a big girl!

1st Grade

2011-11-14T23:24:00.000-05:00

I wrote such a big post last year about Sammi's parent/teacher conference and all about what she was doing in Kindergarten. I don't have as much to say about 1st grade, just because school is not as "new" of a thing any more. Her conference went really great! I really like her teacher this year. She is very creative and does some neat projects with the kids. She also has a student teacher for the first half of the year and she has been really great too. She has done some really cool extra projects with the kids. Over the last few weeks, during "Titan Time", which is when they break up into reading groups, they read a Magic Tree House chapter book together. Then, they used a program called Voki, to create their own characters from the book. They animated them and were able to put their voices over the characters and add backgrounds and cool things. They are going to present their books to each other's groups using their Voki characters. It seems like a cool, fun project! So, Sammi has been enjoying that. She also loves when they do science lessons. And they also had a Japanese Day a few weeks ago. They took their shoes off the whole day, and had some Japanese food and sat on the floor and learned all kinds of cultural things. She really liked that too.

Anyways, so her teacher also brought up the gifted program. She is going to keep her eye on Sammi and look into it more and thinks she could be a good candidate for it. They do some kind of assessment test for reading at the beginning of the year and her score was off the charts. Her reading level is currently a 3.4, which is equivalent to a 3rd grader almost half way through the year. She is also really good at math and has been coming to me with questions like "how many 4's are in 12?". So she is thinking through things like multiplication. And her teacher said she doesn't need to count out addition anymore, but has most of the facts memorized. Her teacher said she also has the creativity and imagination for the program. Sammi really does love to learn so much and is always so interested in so many subjects. She devours books and then comes to me and tells me all the cool facts she learned from reading a book about Panda's, or Reptiles, or whatever it is that day she interested in. I'm pretty sure, if she could, she would love to just go to a museum and follow a guide around all day asking questions. :) Anyways, that girl has some special gifts from God and hopefully if she was in a special program it would help quench her thirst for knowledge. I don't know all the details about the program yet and we will definitely need more information before we decide if it's the right thing to have her tested for it or not. So we'll see!

Sammi's teacher also said she was very well behaved. I asked if she was able to sit still and not interrupt because at home she tends to be very busy and restless and often interrupts when someone is speaking. But, the teacher said she doesn't do any of that in school and is always helpful and listens. She was actually chosen as the star fish winner for October. A student from the class is chosen once a month for demonstrating good behavior or something special. Sammi was chosen because she is always helping the teachers and other students. She got to have special ice cream that day!

Anyways, Sammi really loves school this year! We feel very blessed by the gifts God has given Sammi and we pray and hope that she learns to use them for his glory!

Happy 3rd Birthday Abigail!!

2011-11-12T12:51:00.001-05:00

Hard to believe she is already 3! She has grown up so much the last few months and seems like such a big girl now instead of a baby/toddler. She is so funny and happy and always has to make sure we know she is there. We love her so much! Happy Birthday sweet girl!

Crafts and Halloween

2011-11-10T22:16:00.002-05:00

I’m combining two posts because they kind of go together and I’ve been wanting to post about both things, but never seem to have time! So I’ve mentioned before that I got bit by the craft bug lately! Have you heard of Pinterest? Well, I got addicted to that site and saw so many cute things to make for babies that I just couldn’t help myself!!
My very best friend had her baby girl in October and it was so much fun to make things for her! I also made some things for my sister in law, Norma who is due in Jan. I made this blanket (and a different one for Norma). The elephant part in the middle came as one big panel, so it wasn’t as hard to make as it looks!

And burp clothes!

These shoes were one of my favorite things to make! I made some for Corinne and a couple of other friends too. So cute!!

I also love this bib! I made a few of these for Corinne and friends too.

Leggings!! They remind me of the 80’s, but still so cute! They are just knee high socks, cut off and sewed under. So easy!!

And finally, a pair of the shoes for a friend who has a boy. It was nice to make something for a boy. She sent me the material and I made her the shoes.

Here is Corinne with her new best friend who most of these things were made for! Juliana is so perfect and we have been enjoying the last few weeks of snuggling and holding her every chance we have to go visit! It’s hard to believe it wasn’t that long ago that Corinne was that small!

And finally, for Halloween, I managed to make half the costumes this year. Maddie is Rapunzel and I made the wig out of yarn! She got so many comments about her hair! My Mom made the dress a few years ago for Sammi. She really liked the costume.

Corinne was an ice cream cone!!! I just took some felt and sewed it onto a white hat that I had and added some cotton fluff, a cherry and some felt balls for sprinkles. Easy and cute!

By the time I made all the baby stuff and costumes, I was all crafted out and Sammi was having a hard time making up her mind about a costume. So, I found her a Padame costume from Star Wars (she is really into Star Wars lately!) and Abby is wearing the good old pumpkin costume that all the girls have worn at some point over the last 6 years. They had a great time trick or treating! They all had parties at school that were lots of fun and despite the rain and cold, they probably stayed out with Brandon for an hour and a half trick or treating! I took Corinne to the neighbors we knew for about half an hour and then took her in. Her little hands were so cold! She did like holding that bucket though!

Now I have to start thinking about holiday gifts and crafting! I usually make some kind of gift for teachers and some family members, and I kind of want to get back to knitting, but nothing yet has really striked me as “the” thing to make. I’m sure after some more exploring on pinterest I’ll find it!

Happy Birthday Sammi and Happy Anniversary Brandon!

2011-10-18T21:56:00.001-04:00

Happy 7th Birthday Samantha Jeanne! We are so proud of the little lady you are becoming and love you so much!

And Happy 8th Anniversary Brandon!! I am incredibly blessed to have such an amazing and wonderful husband.

4 month check up

2011-10-16T17:39:00.001-04:00

Corinne had her 4 month check up this week. She is doing great! She gained over 3 lbs and grew over 3 inches! She is now 13lb 2oz and 24.5 inches. She is the EXACT same weight that her time separated twin Sammi was at 4 months, to the ounce. It’s hard to believe how much she is doing lately! She is growing up so fast. We are definitely past the “newborn” stage. In some ways it makes me sad, but it’s also so fun to see her learn so many new things and be able to interact with her now.

We had a very eventful appointment for her well visit. The night before, Abby had 2 falls. She seemed fine at the time, but later when Brandon was getting her dressed, he pulled her from laying down to sitting up. She started crying that her arm hurt. She was very upset the rest of the evening but we thought maybe she was just really tired. She woke up in the night a few times saying it was hurting and she just kept crying and crying in the morning that it was hurting. She wouldn’t really move it and just kept it close to her. It also happened to be a day that Sammi had off school and I really didn’t know how in the world I was going to get all the kids ready and out the door to the appointment with Abby being so upset. Thankfully, my Mom just happened to be dropping off something at my house in the morning. She was just popping in and was ready to head out the door, but I heard her come in and yelled “WAIT! Mom! Don’t leave!”". So thankfully she was able to stay and help me get the kids ready and go to the appointment with me. It was a very loud and chaotic appointment between getting all of Corinne’s checks done and the doctor looking at Abby’s arm and me trying to get a hold of Brandon to find out exactly what happened when she started crying, and having all 4 kids with us. The doctor thought Abby could have just popped something out of place, but since she was also specifically pointing to her wrist and she was able to lift her arm in the air and she had fallend twice, he thought we better get x-rays to make sure there wasn’t a fracture. So, we headed up to Children’s North to get the x-rays done. They were really great with her there and thankfully it didn’t take too long. And so when they turned her arm to get one of the pictures, she cried in pain. But then after the x-ray she was perfectly fine! She was able to move her arm again and she said it didn’t hurt anymore. And the x-rays came back fine. So, we are pretty sure that when they turned her arm to get the picture, it popped back in place! She was so good for the x-rays and they even took an x-ray of a little mermaid doll that she had with her. So it was a crazy day, but it all ended well.

So, back to Corinny. She tried her first bowl of rice cereal this week! She kind of responded the same way she responds to most new things that we put upon her. She didn’t love it, but she didn’t hate it! She did make a couple of funny faces, but she kept eating it! So I’d say it was successful. She seems to just kind of go with the flow with whatever we do to her. I guess that sounds pretty typical for a 4th child.

Getting ready for the first bite.

Hmmm…what is this stuff?

Maddie of course loved feeding her! I can’t see how I am ever going to have time to sit down and feed her food everyday, so I think that will be Maddie’s job once we start doing it more often.

She did make this face a few times! ha!

All the girls had to get in on the action!

All done!!

Corinne continues to be very active! She can now grab onto things and likes to pull on the toys hanging on her car seat. She can also make all the things on her exersaucer work and move, including the VERY annoying star that plays “twinkle, twinkle” over and over! She grabs for my necklaces and the girls hair and is just getting to be pretty good with using her hands!

She is also close to sitting up! She can sit up for awhile, leaning forward like this. She loves to stand too and have someone hold her in the standing position. Her legs are very strong! Anyways, I think that’s about it! I’m sure I am missing other new things she can do, but that’s all I can think of for now.

Other news

2011-10-06T23:04:00.001-04:00

So, what else have we been up to the past month?

Well, Corinne is now 4 months old!! Wow did the summer fly by! She continues to be a sweet little baby. She smiles and laughs and coos at us and we just love it so much. Her and Maddie are inseparable some days. Maddie just loves to take care of her and do things like get her dressed and hold her and talk to her. She was so excited when I let her “carry” her a few feet the other day. I made sure I was right next to her the whole time, but she did great anyways. And now I often will leave the room to go do something and come back to find Maddie holding Corinne on her lap. It’s so sweet.

And Corinne loves to stand up! So Maddie likes to hold her up. Seriously, all my pictures are of Maddie and Corinne b/c they are always together!

Abby has also had some big changes in the last few weeks. First, we painted her room purple! And then she moved into a big girl bed! Once she was settled into her big girl bed, we moved Corinne into her room too! Corinne has been sleeping through the night till about 7 or 8 in the morning, so we decided it was time to try. So far it’s been going pretty well! Abby was a little hesitant at first about giving up her crib. But, now she likes her bed and stays in it for the most part. On the days she naps it can sometimes be hard to get her to stay in it, but usually she does well. And sleep times have adjusted some for both of them and sometimes they wake each other up, but it’s really been working out pretty well! How cute is their room!?

We are also so proud of Abby for giving up her binky this week!! The first night was a little hard to get her to sleep, but the next day I rewarded her with a Rapunzel Barbie that she wanted and she was so thrilled. She never cried or asked for the binky again! We are encouraging her to be a “Big girl” one step at a time with the hopes that maybe she’ll decide she wants to go on the potty in a few months too. It’s been hard for her to let go of her role as “baby” in the family, but I am so proud of her and how hard she is trying! Plus, really, she’ll always be my baby.

And Corinne continues to be a busy little baby! She is so close to rolling from back to belly! Once she does that she will be able to go both ways and will probably become pretty mobile. She already manages to always scoot or spin herself off her blanket.

Oh, and it appears she may be our first real thumb sucker! She has been putting herself to sleep like this for a few nights now.

She is SO sweet and just gives you the sweetest little looks. She also loves the attention her sisters give her. Here is a little video I made of her “talking”. She has definitely found her voice lately!!!

And just for fun I had to post Corinne in her moose outfit that we have had since Sammi was a baby. One picture is of Sammi and one is of Corinne, almost at the same age. Can you tell which is which?

Corinne’s Baptism

2011-10-06T22:30:00.001-04:00

Ok, so this happened a whole month ago!! Yes, I’m a little behind in blogging. The problem is, it’s fall, I have a baby and I’ve been bitten…….by the craft bug!! It seems to happen every fall, but it’s even worse when you have a baby to make cute things for AND your very best friend is very pregnant and you want to make very cute things for her little girl too! So, I will have to do a whole post just on the fun things I made over the past month. But first, a quick post about Corinne’s baptism. She was baptized on Sept. 11th. The service was beautiful and I am so thankful that my own personal photographer, Kat, took these beautiful pictures for me! Ok, so she is just a really great friend, but she COULD be my own personal photographer and I’m so grateful that she likes to use her talents on my girls.

So, Corinne of course had to have a blow out RIGHT before the baptism!! I had fed her before the service and waited till the last possible moment to get her dressed and right when the sermon started, she had a big (and loud!) blow out!! So I had just enough time to go change her diaper and thankfully it only got on her diaper cover and not her dress! Whew!

The dress she wore was my Mom’s when she was a baby! It was so special that she could wear it for her baptism.

And so after her blowout, she fell asleep in my arms. And she slept through the whole thing!! Even when they put water on her head, she didn’t wake up! What a sweet little baby.

We had a big party at our house after with lots of friends and family and neighbors. It was great!!

And here are a few of my other favorite pictures…..

Hee hee….LOVE Matthew’s “Photo bomb”!

The lady on the right is Ms. Lou, who Corinne is named for and who is my Godmother! It was so special that she could share this day with us!

First days of school

2011-09-11T21:35:00.001-04:00

This week the girls started school. FINALLY! Sammi started later this year and it seemed like we have been waiting for the first day of school for a long time. We’ve been watching the other districts buses go by every day for almost 2 weeks and it seemed weird that Sammi still wasn’t in school. The kids have been great all summer and really played well with each other. But, the last few weeks they have been starting to pick on each other and get restless. I will be happy to have a routine and schedule again!

So, Abby was actually the first one to start! Her first day was on Tuesday. She is in the 2 day, 3 year old class (Tues. and Thurs. morning) and has the same teachers that Sammi had when she started! One of her teachers is actually our neighbor and her girls have babysat for us a few times. We love her and it was nice Abby already knew her. Abby did AWESOME for her first week! She absolutely LOVES it, which I knew she would. She has been dying to stay when we would drop Maddie off last year, so she was just beyond excited that she got to stay this time. When we dropped Maddie off the next day, she actually strutted into the room and said “Bye Mommy!” because she thought she it was time for her class again. She was so upset when I told her it was Maddie’s class and we had to go home. I’m pretty sure she would go every day if she could. She just feels so big and proud!

Next to start was Sammi. She was looking forward to 1st grade very much! She came home off the bus the first day and said “It was AMAZING!”. She loves her teacher and was happy to see her friends again.

Last but not least, Maddie started Wednesday afternoon. She is in the 5 year class and will go every Monday – Thursday afternoon. As usual when a change comes into her life, she has been a wreck at home. She has a hard time communicating and has had many tantrums the last few weeks. I think once we get into a routine, things will get better, but it can just be very tiring and frustrating to go through this every time there is a change in our lives. However, on a good note, she has been doing great at preschool!! On the first day, one of her friends from her class last year came in and was upset when her Mom left. Maddie came over to her and was trying to make her feel better and play with her! It was awesome to see Maddie being the one helping another kid instead of being the one who was upset. One of her teachers was her science teacher last year and she couldn’t believe how much more Maddie was talking this year. She only has a few minutes in the beginning when she wants me to stay and watch her write her name, but then she gives me a kiss and hug and says goodbye and is totally fine! It’s great to see her maturing and growing.

It seems kind of crazy to me that 3 of my girls are in school now. And it kind of stinks that Abby and Maddie’s classes are opposite and not at the same time. So it will be a lot of back and forth to the preschool. But, I think I’ve worked out a schedule that will work and it will be nice to just have a schedule to our days. Plus, only Sammi has school on Fridays so I figure that can be our day to just relax at home or do fun things. I’m looking forward to a fun year!

30 and 3 months

2011-09-02T18:48:00.001-04:00

This week I had my golden birthday and turned 30 on the 30th and Corinny turned 3 months on the 31st! People always ask me if we will call Corinne, “Corie” for short to follow suit with the other girls. However, “Corie” just never seemed to fit. I think it was one of my friends who first called her Corinny and then Abby started to call her that and it has kind of stuck!

Anyways, it’s hard to believe how fast she is growing! She is still a peanut though and 0-3 months clothes are just starting to fit right. She even still squeeze into some newborn things. I just love this outfit that a friend passed on to me. And I love her smile in this picture too!

She loves to talk now and sometimes makes some pretty loud noises! I guess she has to speak up if she wants to be heard in this house! She continues to be a very happy baby and is usually content to just lay on the floor or sit in the bumbo. We are thankful a friend had one for us to borrow, but she loves to sit up and be able to look around at all that is going on around her. She has also found her hands and likes to hold them together like this. The girls say she is praying!

She also is a great sleeper! She usually sleeps between 10-12 hours through the night! Sometimes she sleeps till 6:30 or 7 and sometimes a little longer. If she wakes up before 8 to eat, then she usually goes back to sleep for another hour or so, which is nice for me so I have a chance to get a shower and get ready for the day while she is still sleeping. She also no longer needs swaddled. Kind of sad b/c it means she is no longer a little newborn. This was her first night un swaddled. She always sleeps with her hands up by her ears like that!

Brandon and the girls put a lot of sweet effort into my birthday celebration. Brandon stayed up late the night before making dough for calzone’s and then came home early to make them with the girls. They were so good!

He also got me an ice cream cake and I made this raspberry lemon summer cake to eat with the bible study ladies Tuesday morning. It was perfect for this time of year!

Brandon also got me this sewing book. http://www.amazon.com/Amy-Butlers-Stitches-Stylish-Projects/dp/0811851591/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1204401062&sr=8-1 that I requested a while ago. I love it! I have so many ideas of what I want to make for teacher and Christmas gifts this year. Everything in the book is so cute and looks like so much fun to make, I might get a little over ambitious!

And he arranged for me to get my hair done on Wed. He surprised me and made the appointment and arranged for babysitting and everything! I love my new do!

Anyways, it was a fun week of celebrating and I feel good about being 30! As another friend of mine said, I now feel old enough to have 4 kids.

Vacation to Ohio

2011-08-29T21:02:00.001-04:00

I think I may have a problem with taking pictures on vacation! I take way too many! I just want to capture all the fun we are having I guess. So don’t feel bad if you don’t make it through this whole post!

So this year we decided we didn’t want to go too far from home for vacation since we had 4 small kids, including an infant. So we went a few hours away to Sandusky, OH. It was actually a lot of fun! The first 2 days we spent at the Castaway Bay Resort, which is part of Cedar Point. The girls really loved the water park! Here is Corinne in a bathing suit for the first time.

Maddie went down this slide about a hundred times! She also came home with swimmer’s ear, which is a first for anyone in our family.

Abby really surprised us with how much she enjoyed the water! She didn’t want to do any slides, but she LOVED the wave pool! She hated the beach and the waves as a baby, but it looks like she is ready for the beach now. She had no fear and was running full force into the waves! Thankfully they had to wear life jackets while in the wave pool b/c she was just crazy about it!

A view of some of the water park. Sammi loved doing that big slide to your right that you went on in a raft.

Grandpa did a great job watching Corinne while the rest of us were in the water. She thinks he is so funny! She can be in the most somber mood, and then she will look at him and start cracking up! It never fails! Maybe it’s the mustache?

Corinne did try out the water a little too. She really didn’t have much response to it. She wasn’t crying or upset, but she wasn’t like happy and smiling or laughing or anything either. She pretty much just goes with the flow with whatever we are doing.

Abby loved going in this bigger pool too where you could play basketball and ride on these floating creatures. It was fun! And I think Brandon had just as much fun at the water park as the girls did!

I think Sammi enjoyed the water park the most! She went down all the slides by herself dozens and dozens of times!

After the water park, we stayed in a condo in downtown Sandusky for the next 3 nights. It was right on the bay of Lake Erie and really pretty!

Corinne just had a good time hanging out. She loves to sit up like this!

The girls had a big fun time with these paper dolls that my Mom brought for them. There were times they didn’t even want to go anywhere b/c they just wanted to play with them. Who knew paper dolls would be such a big hit!

One of the days, we rode a ferry over the Put in Bay island. The girls thought the boat ride was so fun! There were people throwing pretzels to the seagulls that followed the boat, so they thought that was just great. The seagulls would actually take the pretzels right of your hand! It was pretty neat.

We had thought it was great fun to ride in a golf cart around the island! We had to get one of the super big ones since there were so many of us. It was so funny sputtering along to our destinations and getting lost on the island!

Brandon drove most of the time until he had a few beers at lunch. I think it had been so long since he really relaxed, he just didn’t know what to do with himself! He got a little goofy by the afternoon. Good thing Maddie didn’t mind sitting in the back with him and listening to his geek jokes he kept telling.

The girls went fishing with Brandon right outside our condo one night and caught a catfish!

Another day, we went to a few of the state parks in the area. We stopped at this lighthouse but didn’t realize you couldn’t go in it until the afternoon. So that was a bummer we didn’t get to go up in it.

Abby had the prettiest hair that day…..I just had to take a picture of her golden locks!

And the girls had fun playing on the beach at one of the state parks.

Daddy had just as much as the girls!

Corinne tried out the sand too, and again didn’t have much response to it. She just goes along with whatever we do to her!

There was also a pool at the condo! We had fun swimming in it one of the afternoons. Even Corinne got to go swimming! She seemed to like it ok.

This summer Sammi finally learned how to go under water and kind of swim. She was excited to show off her new skills.

On the way home, we stopped at a place called Hale Farm, which is a working farm from the 1800’s. I highly recommend going there! It was really neat. Everything they do on the farm is how they did it in the 1800’s. It was very authentic and the demonstrators included the kids in everything they were doing. Here the girls are sweeping with brooms that the man made using corn that he grew especially for making brooms.

There was also a lady who was weaving and they even have a dye garden to make their own colors of yarn. Here Maddie and Abby were trying out the loom they had set up for kids.

They also got to be play with the toy guns and line up like they would have in a war!

And Abby was really into churning the butter!

Anyways, that was a really cool place and we hope to go back there again! Our vacation was so relaxing this year and we were surprised at how much there was to do. We didn’t even do everything that we could have. And it was really beautiful on the lake! It’s hard to believe summer is almost over now! Most kids have gone back to school, but Sammi doesn’t start till Sept. 7th. So we are hoping to squeeze a few more fun things in this week!

The Walkers

2011-08-19T16:16:00.002-04:00

Our awesome awesome friend Kat did a photo shoot for us at Hartwood Acres! She even came over and did the girls hair! It was so much fun and we LOVE the pictures! Here is the photo book I made with the pictures!

Click here to view this photo book larger

Long overdue!

2011-08-09T15:29:00.000-04:00

This is a long overdue update! Corinne is already 10 weeks old! How has that much time gone by already?
She had her 2 month check up today and weighed in at 9lbs. 15oz. and 21.5 inches long. She is now in the 20th % for weight and 11% for height! She gained 2 lbs in the last 5 weeks which is great. She has definitely started to get a little bit of chubs, but is still such a peanut.

She is sleeping great. She usually goes to bed around 10 pm and sleeps till 6 or 7 AM! Then she eats and goes back to sleep for a few more hours. She is usually so happy and really only cries when she is hungry or tired and it’s pretty easy to content her. The doctor couldn’t get over how strong she is! She said we could have another early walker on our hands. She actually started to scoot a little the last few weeks. She is nuts! Here is a video of her scooting. She was getting mad so it didn’t last long, but she can make it all the way across the blanket.

Maddie also had her 5 year check up today. She weighs 37 lbs and is 41 inches tall which is the 30% for weight and 20% for height! Overall she is healthy and doing well. Her asthma is much more controlled now, although we will probably have to start doing Pulmicort treatments twice a day in the fall during the sick season again. Right now we just do it once a day. We also talked about her bed wetting at night and her doctor said it’s genetic and there isn’t much we can do except wait for her to outgrow it and it is perfectly normal at age 5. We have been waking her up in the middle of the night b/c she desperately wanted to wear undies to bed. So we’ve been waking her at 10 or 11, then at 2 and then at 5. Last night we didn’t wake her up at 2 though and she still stayed dry, so we are hoping we can drop that wake up. We are going to keep trying this method of waking her up for a few weeks, but if it doesn’t work then we will just wait till she is older.

In other exciting news, Maddie has started to learn how to read! We have a hooked on phonics set, and I have started to do the Kindgarten level with her. She has caught on very quickly and is so so excited that she can now read some of the stories on her own. Watching your child learn now to read is just one of the most thrilling parts of motherhood!

We also tried potty training with Abby. I won’t go into details, but bascially it was a complete disaster! She did ok the first few days, but she developed a fear of peeing and it kept getting worse and worse until she actually refused to even pee in her diaper. She seems better today and we are just going to let it go for a while now. It was a horrible experience though and beyond stressful!

I guess that's all the big news for now! The summer has been flying by and we have just been keeping busy! Only one more month till school starts! We are looking forward to vacation in a few weeks and then we’ll just be getting ready for school.

7 weeks

2011-07-21T21:24:00.001-04:00

Corinne turned 7 weeks old this week! How the time is flying!! A few weeks ago she gave us her first real smile. Every day now she gives a few smiles here and there. They are not all the time yet, and we have to work for them. But, when she does smile for us, we all get so excited! The girls love trying to make her smile. Of course, they are hard to catch on film! I did manage to catch the end of one though.

Before I posted before that Corinne looked just like Maddie. Well, one night she went to bed looking like Maddie and the next day she woke up looking like Sammi!! It is actually scary how much she looks like Sammi at times. I often feel like I am just holding Sammi again as a baby! It is a very weird feeling, but sometimes she just looks SO much like her. Brandon says we have just come full circle. ha! It was hard to find the perfect picture to compare them, so this was the best I could come up with.

Here is Corinne at the end of her smile.

And here is Sammi around the same age with the same smile! Their eyes might be a little different, but everyone always comments on how she has Sammi’s nose.

Overall we are doing much better! I started to take some meds for the postpartum depression and after about a week, I really started to feel a difference. I feel so much better now! I have more energy, and the headaches I was getting have gone away too. And in general I just feel more happy and like myself. The kids seems to be pretty well adjusted now too and I have even ventured out a few times with all 4 of them for fun outings and survived.

Corinne continues to be very alert and active. She can really get those hands and feet motoring when she is laying on the floor! She rolled over from her back to her tummy now too and then started to push herself forward with her legs a little. This girl is crazy! She can be very busy and active just like Sammi was. But, she also loves to snuggle and be held close like Maddie and Abby did. We just love her to pieces!!

Summer camps

2011-07-19T17:03:00.000-04:00

I’ll post about Maddie’s birthday soon! First I wanted to post about the girls camps they have been doing this summer. We have had a camp every week since the week after school finished! First, Sammi did CAT camp (creative arts and theater) at St. Paul’s preschool. She enjoyed it, mostly because her best friend, Caitlyn was there! Caitlyn has since moved to Kansas, so it was nice Sammi got to spend some extra time at camp with her. They sang songs and did art projects and it was similar to a VBS but with more arts and crafts.

The next week, both Sammi and Maddie did Summer Surge at a different local church. They both LOVED this camp. Maddie was happy because she got to be in Sammi’s group, so that helped her with her shyness. And her counselors said that Sammi was always looking out for Maddie and helping her, which was really sweet. For this camp, they did the popular “Panda Mania” VBS package. We bought the CD for it and the girls absolutely love all the songs. Even Maddie kept saying every day how much fun the camp was! So I’m glad they got to do one together and enjoyed it so much. Here is a picture from the final show where the kids sang some of the songs for us. You can see that Maddie didn’t want to sing in front of a crowd, but the fact that she even stood up there was a big deal for her!
Then, Maddie started preschool camp, which was 3 days a week for 2 weeks. This was at St. Paul’s preschool as well and was just a smaller version of regular preschool. Maddie was excited about this because she got to see her teachers and friends from preschool. And on Thursdays, they had water day and the kids got to wear their bathing suits and they got out the baby pools for the kids to play in. Oh, and we can’t forget about the freeze pop they got every day at the end! That seemed to be a highlight for Maddie!

Sammi also went to Twilight Camp, which was in the evenings for a week. This was through girl scouts and the theme was space. They learned about stars and also had a swimming day, where they got to swim in the big pool they have at the camp. I’m not sure Sammi loved this camp as much as the other’s, but overall she still had fun.

Last week, Sammi went to probably her favorite camp. It was a Children around the world choir camp, held at our church by the Oakland Girls Choir. She LOVED this camp! It was all day and they learned songs and dances from other countries. It was a very well put together camp and Sammi really loved all the singing and dancing. The adults at the camp kept going on and on about how well Sammi did and how much they enjoyed having her there. They said she had a really good voice and was so mature for her age! So that was nice to hear. She had an incident with a pole the first day, and ended up with a big bruise on her head. Sammi seems to get injured wherever she goes!Thankfully she was fine though! They had a performance at the end of the week, and unfortunately Brandon and I did not get to see it. It was for a good reason though, since we had a wedding of a good friend to go to. My Mom and Dad went to the performance and took a few videos for me. Here is short clip of one of the songs they performed.

FINALLY, this is the last week of camps. Sammi is going to VBS at St. Paul’s. The VBS at St. Paul’s has 250 kids and was rather overwhelming for Maddie last year, so she decided she did not want to go this year.

I have to give a HUGE thank you to my Mom and Dad. There is no way the girls could have done so many camps without their help. They dropped off the girls and picked them up almost every single day. There was really only one or two times that I had to do it and even then, I still had help getting the kids ready. This morning was the first day that I really got all 4 kids ready and out the door before 9AM. I was pretty proud! So we are all very thankful to Grandma and Grandpa for helping so much and making it possible for the girls to do so many fun things this summer!

Happy 5th Birthday Maddie!!

2011-07-17T12:24:00.001-04:00

5 seems like such a big milestone, yet here we are already! It has been amazing watching Maddie grow and mature in the last year. She has really blossomed and become more outgoing. She is such a sweetheart who takes such good care of her little sisters, and is best friends with her big sister. We couldn’t be more proud of her and love her so much. Today we are celebrating by having her first big friend party at Build a bear! And then later we will have a campfire at the house with smores and cake with our friends and family. Happy Birthday sweet Madeline Anne!

26 days old

2011-06-26T17:41:00.000-04:00

And the little bugger is already rolling over! I wanted to give her some tummy time, so I put her on her tummy this afternoon. The last thing I expected was her to roll over to her back! So the first time she did it, I just thought maybe it was just a fluke or something. So I turned her over to see what she would do and grabbed the camera just in case. She started out with both her arms out in front of her and then started pecking the blanket like she was rooting. She found her arm and somehow tucked it under her chin and then did this......

I could hardly believe it! I am in serious trouble if she is already doing this! She has also made it on to her side from her back, so I'm curious to see how long it will take her to figure out the rest.

She has been a very alert and active baby since day one and she absolutely LOVES to just lay on the floor and motor. It is so cute to watch her and she just looks all around at everything going on around her, which is usually a lot! I guess she doesn't want to miss out on anything. :)

She also likes to pull on her hair! Which, to me, looks red in the sunlight! Perhaps it will be like Abby's and kind of blondish, reddish? Or maybe it will stay dark? I guess only time will tell!

She continues to be a good sleeper and usually goes to bed around 9 or 9:30 and sleeps till about 3 AM. It's too bad I'm not very good at going to bed when she does! Then she usually eats and goes back to sleep till about 6 or 7 AM. Sometimes she has a hard time going back to sleep after the 3AM feeding because of gas issues. It's hard to get her to burp in the middle of the night, so that is part of the problem. But it's not like she is up crying or screaming or anything. She just kind of grunts and groans for an hour or so after eating, which keeps Brandon and I awake! Oh, well...I really can't complain b/c she does sleep 6-7 hours in a row and has from the beginning. During the day, she eats about every 2-3 hours and often just takes little cat naps throughout the day. Some afternoons she will take a couple hour nap if she happens to be awake all morning. But even when she is awake, she is usually just happy to chill in her swing and lay on the floor and kick. So she is a pretty easy baby and just so cute and sweet. :)

I have been having a hard time bouncing back this time and have been dealing with some postpartum depression. Thankfully, I have the most wonderful Mom and husband who have been with me every day and taking care of not only me, but also the other girls and my house! I really feel so blessed to have such great support and help. I could be really bad off by now if it wasn't for them. And hopefully things will get better over time.

Abby is adjusting and getting better. She still is pretty attached to Mommy and she has her little moments every day. But, she is so much better than that first week or two and is definitely improving. And now, every time she comes home or even just up the stairs from playing, she always asks me where Corinne is. She doesn't just call her "baby" anymore, but always calls her by her name. Sammi and Maddie are always asking to hold her and just give her so much love and attention. They also like to laugh at her and all the funny movements and faces she makes. They have really been playing so nicely together the last few weeks and have really bonded as sisters. Next week, they are both going to camp so I think that will be fun for them.

It's hard to believe Corinne is almost 4 weeks old already! It feels like we have had her forever, yet time is also flying by. We just love her so much. :)

Corinne meets her namesake!

2011-06-23T21:56:00.001-04:00

Monday night we went to my Godmother’s house so she could meet Corinne. Corinne’s middle name, Louise, was given to her in honor of my Godmother, Mary Louise Beckstrom. But we have always just called her Ms. Lou. With my grandparents living far away, Ms. Lou was always like a grandma to me. She has known me since I was born and she has always been there to celebrate my birthday or graduation or any big event in my life. And now all my kids just love going to visit her! She plays games with them and plays them songs on the piano and just enjoys their company.

Ms. Lou held Corinne all evening and just marveled over her. She told me more than once how honored she was that she was given her name. It was such a special evening!

Kennywood!

2011-06-20T21:59:00.001-04:00

We had our first trip to Kennywood on Saturday for Brandon’s work picnic. It was probably over doing it for me to go with the baby, but I just didn’t want to miss seeing my kids have fun there. So, Brandon took Sammi and Maddie right after lunch and then I came with my Mom and Dad and Abby and the baby around 4:00. Last year, Abby hated the rides! She didn’t even like the merry go round. So I was curious to see how she would react this year. We started out at the motorcycles since that is a very tame kiddie ride. She was very excited at first and hopped right on!

She looks so grown up to me in this picture!

It seemed like she was having a blast!

But, we were all cheering for her and making a fuss and I think she didn’t like that, so then she started to cry! So that ride didn’t end to well!

So, we went over to the pavilion for Brandon’s work for the prize drawing and Brandon actually won this time! He won a $50 gift card to Best Buy! So that was fun! We ate our picnic dinner and the kids also got prizes and got to meet Kenny Kangaroo. Sammi actually liked Kenny Kangaroo this time and got her picture taken with him. Maddie kept her distance from him and Abigail was absolutely terrified of him!

Then it started to rain, so we went over quickly to the train since that is a covered ride. Corinne woke up at this point and enjoyed all the excitement around her! Unfortunately, her stroller/car seat got soaked at this point so I had to carry her in the sling the rest of the day. It worked out ok, it was just a little hard for me since I’m still recovering.

We also rode the Merry Go Round and then it stopped raining so we went back to Kiddie Land! And this time Abby LOVED the rides! She rode almost everything and had no hesitations about any of the rides. It was so cute to see all 3 girls riding together.

I love this one of Sammi! ha!

We also got to meet up with our good friends there and Abby had fun riding with Dillon!

We were all exhausted by the time we got home, but the girls had such a fun time!

School’s out for summer!!

2011-06-09T17:14:00.001-04:00

It is so hard to believe that Sammi has already finished a whole year of kindergarten!! It seemed like just yesterday that she was getting on that big bus for the first time. It’s amazing how much she has grown and how independent she has become over the last year! She absolutely loved school and her teacher! On Monday, I went to her kindergarten picnic with Corinne to celebrate the end of school.

This is her with her wonderful teacher, Mrs. Franz. I really hope my other girls have her as a teacher too one day!

Sammi was so excited to show off her new baby sister. Thankfully, she just slept the whole time!

Sammi with some of her friends from her class!

Sammi with her friends, Griffin and Emily. Griffin is probably her closest “boy” friend. They always seem to be together!

This will probably be the longest summer we will ever have, since Sammi does not go back until Sept. 7th this year!! We have both Sammi and Maddie signed up for quite a few camps and vacation bible schools though, so I think we will have plenty to keep us busy! I’m looking forward to having my big now 1st grader home for summer!!

Corinne’s birth story

2011-06-07T18:07:00.000-04:00

I had some signs on the weekend that perhaps labor could be soon, but “soon” could also mean another week or two, so I really didn’t think Corinne would be born till the following week. Only Sammi had come as early as Corinne, beating her by one day. Maddie and Abby were both in the 38th week so I was expecting Corinne to be around the same. Memorial Day weekend was very relaxing and we had a lot of nice family time together. And perhaps my mind or body knew what was coming because I was also motivated to get a bunch of small things around the house done, like bills and washing sheets. Anyways, Monday evening during bed time, Sammi asked me “Mommy, what if the baby just popped out tonight?”. I said “Well, I don’t think she will just pop out, but there is a possibility she could come tomorrow”. So Sammi said, “well, I’m going to pray for that right now then”. And she did! All evening I felt kind of different, and every time the baby would move it was a little painful. But, usually when I feel braxton hicks or pains, I just go to bed and they go away. So I figured the same would happen this time. I went to bed around 11pm. Around 12:30 I woke up to a gush and at first I thought it might have just been pee. So I went the bathroom, but when I stood up, more started gushing out and so I really thought my water was leaking then. I woke Brandon up and we finished getting things for my hospital bag ready and called my parents. I also took a shower and had a snack. I was having some contractions, but they weren’t very consistent. The leaking part slowed down and although I was pretty sure it was leaking, I didn’t think it had completely broken. I called my doctor then and she wanted me to come in to make sure my water was leaking. For some reason, my doctor’s all thought that since it was my 4th, things could move really quickly once my water broke so that was another reason they wanted me to come in. If only that were the case!!
I think we got to the hospital around 2:30am. They checked me and by my water had definitely broke and I was already at 5cm! The contractions I was having were showing up as being off the charts, but to me they only felt like they were around a 3 in terms of pain. I could definitely feel them, but they weren’t too bad and were not very consistent. The baby was also very very high so they did not want me to walk around. I was ok with that at that point b/c it was the middle of the night and I was tired and just wanted to rest. Oh, and the nurse who did the IV was wonderful!! The IV was one of my biggest concerns b/c I usually have a hard time getting it in right and usually have to be pricked 3-4 times before they get it. This nurse got it on the first try and it hardly hurt at all. So that was a blessing. So, we just kind of hung out for the first part of the morning and tried to rest a little. They checked me again around 5:30 or so and I was still at 5cm. The doctor wanted to give me Pitocin but I really didn’t want it so she was ok with waiting. At 7:00, Dr. Bergman came on and he was wonderful and very laid back. He didn’t pressure me to do anything I didn’t want to do and was very reassuring throughout the labor. Not much happened for the rest of the morning. Around 11:30 they checked again and I was still only 5cm! The contractions were getting stronger and more painful, but they were still inconsistent. Thankfully, the baby had moved down though! So I was now able to walk around my room a little and at least get up. I was pretty sure gravity would help things along, so I was very happy about this. So I walked back and forth across my room for a very long time. The contractions started to become more regular and more intense and were about 2-3 minutes a part. I thought for sure that now things must be progressing. I used the birthing ball a little too when I needed to sit down. Every time I sat down though, the contractions would start spreading out again. So, I was pretty much on my feet from noon on. Around 2:30 the contractions had really intensified and for most of them I needed to lean on Brandon. My legs were getting very tired and I was starting to feel a lot of pressure like maybe I would have to push soon. When I was at this point with Abby, I was about 8cm and I only had about a half hour left before she was born. So I was thinking the end had to be near and I could get through just a little more. I was so disappointed when the doctor checked me again and I had only progressed to 6cm!!! How could that be!? After all the work I did over the last 2 hours. He said I could still go from 6 –10 cm in 10 min. or it could be a few more hours. I tried not to think about it being hours longer and just kept breathing through the contractions. Around 3:45 I was reaching my limit of how much I could take. I was completely exhausted from being up all night, from being on my feet for 4 hours and from contracting every 2-3 minutes pretty hard for those last 4 hours. The contractions were really bad at this point and it felt like I could only take a few more. I also still felt like I could have to push at any minute, yet I wasn’t quite there. So, the nurse checked me and I felt so defeated when she told me I was only at 7cm. I collapsed on the bed and started crying and said I couldn’t do anymore. I was too tired and I just wanted to give up. I started asking about getting an epidural. I never had one before, but I felt like I could not take another hour of this kind of pain when I was so tired. But even if I got an epidural I knew it would still be 20-30 minutes before it would be in and working. I didn’t know how I would make it even that long. So the doctor came in and it seemed everyone around me was discussing whether I should get an epidural or not. All the while I was just screaming in pain and I just wasn’t in a place to make any kind of decision. Then the resident guy came and asked if he could check me again. I am pretty sure it was around 4:00 at this point. He did a very thorough exam and said I was closer to 8. And I am pretty sure he knew what he was doing and was trying to get things to progress. Well, it worked!!! The second he was done I went into transition! This transition was different from Abby’s, which was tolerable. I remember having this same sensation and horrible pain with Maddie when I went into transition with her, who I also went from 6 –10cm in about 10min. with! I could feel the pain all through my body and I had to cling to Brandon and it was all I could do to even breath. They kept telling me to blow out the birthday candles, and that helped some. I had two of those contractions and started screaming that I needed to push. It seemed like an eternity to me before the doctor gave the ok to push, although it was probably only a few minutes. I had 2 pushes, which seemed very long and hard to me. They kept telling me to calm down and not scream and it was hard for me to even consider that. But, pushing was better when I didn’t scream. I felt like I couldn’t push hard enough and she wasn’t coming out fast enough, although in reality it all happened very fast! Her head came out and then the cord was very very long and so it was wrapped around shoulders. So it took another few seconds to get the rest of her out. And then she was here!! She was born at 4:18pm! She looked so so tiny on my chest. She didn’t cry right away and I kept asking if she was ok and why she wasn’t crying, but the nurse didn’t seem worried and just kept rubbing her back and neck. Eventually she cried and she was just beautiful! I didn’t have any tearing, not even a scratch, so that was good. Corinne’s face was all bruised because she came down so quickly. I guess because her head was so tiny, that could have been why it was so hard for my cervix to dilate and for her to move down. I don’t know how in the world I got through that labor except by the grace of God. Abby’s birth was so perfect and easy and so “textbook”, that I guess I just expected the same. Out of the 4, this labor was longest and hardest and most painful! But, it is over now and we are so blessed to have Corinne!

Madeline and Corinne

2011-06-06T22:10:00.001-04:00

There are times that I see features of Sammi or Abby when I look at Corinne. But, I think Corinne looks the most like Maddie! I guess that is fitting since Maddie is also the most taken with Corinne. They already have such a sweet bond.

Here are the pictures for comparison. They are wearing the same outfit! The first is of Maddie and the second is of Corinne.

Corinne’s first bath

2011-06-04T18:19:00.001-04:00

Corinne had her first bath today! There has been lots and lots of pooping and spitting up, so it was time. Sammi and Maddie loved watching and helping with it. Abby was napping, so she’ll have to help with the next one. Just before her bath, Corinne was wide awake and kicking and punching! I can’t get over what an alert baby she is!

She lost her cord just before the bath! I love seeing her belly button! I think Abby’s fell off at 4 days too.

The first wash wasn’t too bad……

But she didn’t like it after that! Brandon moved quickly!

All clean and happy again!

She had her first office visit this morning to follow up with about her jaundice. Her level actually went up instead of down so that was a little disappointing. But, since the nurse came yesterday, my milk has come in and she gained back a few ounces and has started pooping normally. So those are all good things to help the jaundice go down. The nurse is coming back tomorrow to do another blood draw and weight check and hopefully her level will be starting to go down now. She weighed an even 6lbs this morning!

Our newest baby girl!

2011-06-03T17:19:00.001-04:00

We are so thrilled to announce the birth of our newest baby girl. Corinne Louise Walker was born on May 31st at 4:18pm. She weighed 6lbs 7oz and was 18inches long. We are so in love with her!!

I will post a full birth story later, but this labor was probably the hardest and longest of the 4! Sammi said to me the night before, “Mommy what if the baby just popped out tonight?!”. I said “well, she probably won’t just pop out but she could come tomorrow.” So Sammi said, “well I’m going to pray that she comes tomorrow right now!”. I went to bed around 11pm and around 12:30 AM woke up with my water leaking!! She was born at 37 weeks and 5 days, just one day later than Sammi was born. So I wasn’t really expecting her to come that early and really thought she would be born in June, not May! But, I guess Sammi’s prayers were answered and she came a little early.

It was an exhausting labor since I had only gotten about an hour of sleep before and very hard at the end. She ended up coming down very quickly though so her face was all bruised when she came out. It was a completely natural birth and I never did get any drugs or an epidural and there were lots of things to be thankful for about the labor and birth. I will post more details later, but for now we are just happy to have her here!!

One of her first pictures! Corinne pronounced (ko RIN) means a young maiden. It was a name we had on a list a long time ago for one of the other girls and the meaning seemed to fit since she is the youngest of 4 girls. Most people already spell it wrong or pronounce it wrong, so I feel kind of bad she’ll have to deal with that the rest of her life. But, we just thought it was a beautiful name for a beautiful girl! We haven’t decided yet if we will ever shorten it to some version of Cori. I’m not even sure how we would spell it if we do shorten it. For now, she is just Corinne and we’ll just have to see later if a nickname sticks or not. Her middle name, Louise, is after my Godmother, Mary Louise Beckstrom. She is like a Grandmother to me and so that is where we got Louise.

So far she is doing really well. When we left the hospital she was down to 6lbs and today at her home visit she was 5 lbs. 13oz. But, they said that was a normal amount to lose. She is also slightly jaundice, so we had to bring home a billi blanket to put her on. Her first appointment in the office is tomorrow morning so hopefully her levels will be down and we won’t have to use the blanket after today. She started nursing right after birth and latched on right away! So far she is doing pretty well with that. Even though she came a little early, she is surprisingly a pretty alert baby. She wakes up on her own to eat every few hours and we don’t have to do things like strip her down just to keep her awake to eat. And she already has some alert times when she just looks around happy. So far she has been a wonderful baby who is easily contented.

The girls have been doing pretty well with the adjustment as well. Sammi of course is a pro at being a big sister and she just loves to tell everyone about her baby sister. She is so excited and is very helpful to me and with her other sisters.

Maddie holds her arms like this before she holds Corinne. She is READY! Maddie has been sooo wonderful with the baby. She just loves her so much and she is actually very helpful. I think she has been the most pleasant child as far as attitude and demeanor and is just plain happy. She has such mothering instincts and will hold the baby for me for a long time and know exactly what to do to keep Corinne happy. Maddie is really just bubbling over with joy and happiness over her baby sister.

Abby is excited about her baby sister also, however she has been having a rather rough time adjusting. Before Corinne was born, she was very much a two year old with a very stubborn and independent attitude. Now things have just multiplied by 10! We have had LOTS of tantrums and time outs the past few days. She loves Corinne and thinks she is so funny and loves to hold her. But, she is also having a hard time adjusting to not having Mommy’s full attention. It was hard on her when I was in the hospital and not around and now I am not able to do all the things for her that I use to do, so I think she is feeling pretty insecure right now. I am trying to give her some one on one time with me as much as I can and hopefully that will help her adjust. Hopefully it will just be rough for a few weeks or so.

I think Corinne looks the most like Maddie! I will have to post a comparison of baby pictures, but if you look at Maddie’s baby pictures and Corinne’s they are very similar. Maddie was just a lot bigger. We see features from Sammi and Abby too and I think she just fits in perfectly as a Walker girl. And it’s hard to tell in the pictures, but her hair is very dark! It’s almost black and she has quite a bit of it. It’s hard to tell still what color her eyes will be. Here is one I took when she was alert in the middle of the night!

This was right before we got to go home. I just love her so much!

My wonderful friend Kat came to visit me in the hospital and brought me donuts and cupcakes!! They were so good after not being able to eat anything sweet for a long time!! And she brought adorable matching outfits for all 4 girls! She also did a little photo shoot of Corinne and I just love the pictures she got. Here are a few of my favorites. The hat is one that I knitted for Corinne.

Recovering this time as been more tiring and painful, I think because the labor was so hard and because of the lack of sleep. I’m so thankful my Mom is able to help me and Brandon is able to take a few days off work too. It is all worth it though and we are just beyond grateful and joyful over little Corinne.

36 weeks!!

2011-05-20T10:00:00.000-04:00

I had my 36 week appointment yesterday. We are getting close!! I gained ~3 pounds since my last appointment so I think my total is around 15. I had my strep B test, so hopefully that will be negative. My blood sugars have been really good lately and they have even dropped more in the last week. So it’s nice that I haven’t had to stress about that too much. I even pleaded with the Joslin diabetes center and got out my appointment with them that I was supposed to have this week! I am so thankful that I have been able to stay off of insulin and my OB said he knows that is no small feat! He said the Joslin people should be proud of how well I have done!
At my last appointment, the doctor said I didn’t even need to do the NST’s. However, she is probably the most laid back in the group and the doctor I saw this week still likes to do them no matter what. So, they hooked me up to the monitor for a little. At first I was laying down, but it was SOOO uncomfortable and my hip was KILLING me! So, I ended up just sitting up to do it and I plan on doing that again if I have to do an NST next time. And thankfully baby girl did just great on it!
He also did an internal exam and I am 1cm+ dilated. I know it doesn’t mean much, but it’s better than zero! He also said that she is not low low, but not high either. She is kind of in the middle and right on top of my bladder!! I have been so uncomfortable lately and knew she had to be pushing on it. I constantly feel like I have to pee and she just feels so heavy and like she is just hanging there! The pressure is just unbelievable! I really hope she decides to come sooner than later! I’ve had lots of Braxton Hicks, but pretty much have had those for the last month or maybe even more.
Anyways, I am definitely getting anxious to meet our newest little girl and ready to not be pregnant anymore! I haven’t posted too many pictures, so here is a shot that was taken this week. I’ve also had some cramping and at times it is pretty painful. I’m pretty sure that is because of where she is laying too.

Maddie’s last day of preschool!

2011-05-19T11:26:00.001-04:00

Yesterday was Maddie’s last day of preschool and picnic! It’s hard to believe she has already finished a whole year of preschool! She has come SO far and has really opened up in the last year. We had her parent-teacher conference a few weeks ago. Her teacher said that her transitions from me and from different activities are so much better. She wouldn’t even talk to the teachers in the beginning and now she will chat away with them! She can still be very shy in group situations. For example, when they do something like the weather chart, the teacher would ask the class a question and Maddie would raise her hand excitedly b/c she wanted to answer. But then when the teacher would call on her, she would put her head down and clam up. And she can be very stubborn about certain things and often wants things to be perfect. So, sometimes she won’t try new things b/c she is afraid of messing up. But, she loves to do art projects and is very good at sequencing and sorting and patterns. She is also very good with scissors and she can write most of her letters and numbers. She knows how write both Maddie and Madeline now!

Her teacher also said she is very observant and always concerned about others. She is such a sweet little girl and we love her so much!

We had a fun time at her picnic, although the weather made it be an inside picnic! All the kids got to take home a folder that had a book with a sample of their artwork from each month. It also had a little book with a page from each kid saying what they were going to do this summer. Maddie said she was going to go swimming and play outside! Sounds good to me She was sad about preschool being over and teared up a little when she had to hug her teachers. She told me she was just going to miss them so much! But, she will see them this summer at preschool camp so I think that will be good for her.

Here she is with her folder of her work.

So proud!

They made us play a bunch of games with the kids after we ate. We did relay races and an obstacle course and they also did face painting for the kids. It was kind of exhausting for this pregnant mama! But, thankfully I did get out of doing the belly board race! Maddie raced another little boy whose Mommy was also pregnant.

At the very end, we did the big parachute and each kid got a turn to be “tossed”!! Maddie was beyond excited! They just tossed the kids a little bit, but she thought it was just so fun.

Here she is with 2 of her little friends. How cute is this!!? I’m so happy she made friends in preschool and she would pretty much talk about a different girl after each class. I think some of them will be in her class next year so that is great too!

Asthma

2011-05-17T20:01:00.000-04:00

So we had a good follow up appointment today for Maddie's asthma! Her doctor really listened to our concerns and agreed that what we had been doing was not enough to control her asthma.

So we are now going to do Pulmicort, which is a prevenative steroid, twice a day through the nebulizer. And Maddie is also going to start taking Singulair, which is a chewable pill that keeps inflammation down, daily. We also are going to get her an inhaler to use if she does have a flare up. I feel so much better having an inhaler that we can take with us. When she does have a flare up, it usually comes on very very quickly and we are not always close to home or can't rush home to do a treatment on the nebulizer. Just a few weeks ago, we were at Sammi's soccer practice and it was kind of cold and damp out. Maddie was playing with Brandon and was running back and forth over and over. All of a sudden she started having a tight cough and she couldn't stop coughing until we got home about 45 minutes later and did a nebulizer treatment. So it's in cases like that that it would be good to have the inhaler. Plus, she might be at preschool and daycare all day for a day or two a week in the fall and so I would feel better if they had the inhaler for her there as well.

Hopefully though, doing all the preventive medicine daily will keep her breathing well and keep her from having any asthma "attacks" and keep her out of the ER! Her doctor said that giving her Pulmicort and Singulair daily was so much better for her lungs than needing to use the rescue inhalant, Albuterol even occasionally. So I feel much better about her treatment and what we are doing now to keep her breathing well. We are also going to set up an appointment with a Pulminologist. I am thinking we will do that after the baby is born since I'm not sure what our schedule will be in a few weeks! And that will also give us a few weeks of doing the new treatment to see how it's working and to see if we have any questions about it.

Her doctor also said she will still most likely outgrow the asthma by the time she is 8 or 9, so we are hoping that will be true! She said she might always have trouble around cats, but hopefully her daily breathing will improve when she gets older.

I feel so bad that she has to go through all this, but I am thankful for her doctor and that we have a good plan now to help her!

Maddie's trip to Children's

2011-05-14T22:27:00.000-04:00

Tuesday night we had to make a trip to Children's Hospital with Maddie. She was wheezing and after 3 nebulizer treatments she was getting worse and not better, so we decided we needed to take her to the hospital. You could hear her wheezing from across the room and her breaths were pretty labored. We tried to help her at home with treatments for as long as we could, so by the time we actually decided to go to the hospital it was around midnight! Maddie was wide awake, although I don't know how she could go to sleep with how hard she was wheezing anyways. Brandon didn't want me to go along since I am so pregnant, but Maddie was upset and scared and I just couldn't let her leave crying and upset. So my Mom came over to sleep at our house and stay with Sammi and Abby so Brandon and I could both go with Maddie. Maddie was such a brave little girl and as we went down Rt. 28 we showed her the hospital with the lights on the roof that changed color. She thought that was just the coolest thing ever! We had to wait for awhile once we got there, but thankfully it wasn't for too terribly long. I'm sure they deal with lots of kids with asthma there and they really didn't even ask us too many questions or anything. All we had to say was she has asthma and was wheezing and they knew exactly what to do. The nurse weighed her and put the bandaid thing around her finger that measures her heart rate and blood oxygen level. The doctor listened to her breath and then right away they started her on an hour long treatment of Abuterol through a nebulizer machine that they have. Maddie was so excited that she got a dinosaur mask! They also gave her a dose or oral steroids. Thankfully, I also thought ahead this time and brought our portable DVD player and a few movies. So, Maddie just sat and watched Tangled while she did her treatment. She started to sound better pretty quickly and once she was done with her hour long treatment, they did a shorter treatment of Adravent(?) which I guess dries all the stuff in her airways up. The last time she was in the ER for her asthma, they had to do 2 hour long treatments and because her heart rate was so high from the steroids they had to give her an IV. I was DREADING that they would have to do that again, but we are so thankful that it was not necessary this time!! The one treatment was enough to get her breathing well enough to go home. So, the whole trip took about 3 hours and we got home around 3:30 in the morning. Maddie did so well through the whole thing. She was giggling with the nurses and seemed please with all the attention that she got! She was also so tickled that she was still awake when it was almost morning! Thankfully, my Mom stayed at our house and helped Sammi get to school in the morning and then took Abby with her to her house so I could sleep in a little. And Maddie slept in too.

Maddie was still wheezing a little in the morning, but we just kept up with her nebulizer treatments every 3-4 hours for the next few days and she is starting to do better. She has also had to take the oral steroids for the past few days which made her somewhat irritable and angry, but the side affects were the worst the first few days and she has been better since.

She has a follow up appointment on Tuesday with our pediatrican and I have so many questions about her asthma. It seems that this time the triggers were a cold that she had for a few days and being outside for a few hours that morning. I was at work that day, but her babysitter took the girls to the park for a few hours and she was running around a lot. She is not technically allergic to pollen, but I believe that there is something in the air in the spring time that triggers her asthma and is an irritant to her airways. She always seems to have the worst cases in the spring. There was a high pollen count that day and she was still wheezing a little every day until it finally rained on Thursday evening. Then she finally really started to improve. We have also noticed lately that exercise, specifically running, can trigger her asthma. So, probably the combination of those triggers was just too much for her body to recover. She does take a preventative steroid, Pulmicort, through her nebulizer every day, but that seems to only keep her daily breathing normal. If there are "triggers" then it does not seem to be enough to prevent an asthma attack. And without the Pulmicort, she is coughing and sounds raspy on a daily basis without having any triggers. There are days we miss treatments and perhaps we just need to be more diligent about doing them. It can just be tough sometimes to fit in a half hour long treatment! Her doctor keeps saying she will outgrow this, but the age she says she will outgrow it by keeps increasing and she seems worse to me now than she did even a year ago. Anyways, I just have tons of questions about asthma and what is best for Maddie and how to avoid more trips to the ER so I am anxious for her appointment on Tuesday!

We are thankful that the hospital trip went so well this time, despite it being in the middle of the night. And we are thankful that Maddie is ok. I'll try to update after Tuesday and I'll also try to update about the baby this week! I have my 36 week appointment on Thursday! Hard to believe we are getting so close!

My high tech Mother’s Day gift!

2011-05-08T15:00:00.001-04:00

When I was in Kindergarten, I mostly remember playing with play dough and making things out of construction paper and glue. On Friday, I went to Sammi’s school for a special presentation her class had put together for Mother’s Day. This was no simple presentation with a song and a paper card. No, the kids put together an entire presentation using a smart board!! The teacher scanned the pictures we sent in of Mommy and our child, but the kids did all the rest. They typed everything themselves and they all knew how to make the smart board work! It’s amazing that this is the new era of kindergarten!

It was an adorable presentation. The kids would all say together, for each child, “Sammi loves her Mom”. Then, the child would come up and read the page they had created on the smart board about why their Mommy was the best. The teacher did type underneath the kids typing a translation of what the kids had wrote, since most of the words were written phonetically and not correctly. Some of the kids said the funniest things though!

Sammi went first so I missed recording the beginning of her presentation, but here is what I got.

The kids also gave us each a rose and their page from the smart board in a frame. I love what Sammi said on hers! It’s funny how the things that don’t seem like a big deal to me, like pouring her cereal or making her bed, apparently get her attention and show her that I love her.

Maddie also had a little presentation for Mother’s Day at her school on Friday. This was the much more traditional presentation where the kids sang a cute song and then gave us a card and paper flower with their picture on it that they had made. Maddie was so proud and happy to give it to me and I was just as pleased to get it from her.

The 2 presentations were very different, but both equally sweet and both made me feel like the luckiest Mommy in the world!!

Happy Mother’s Day!!!

33 weeks 1 day!

2011-04-29T16:15:00.001-04:00

Only 4 more weeks till I am full term! There is A LOT going on in May with the girls schools, so I’m hoping that makes this next month go by quickly! I am getting anxious to not be pregnant anymore and to meet this little girl.

At my last appointment last week, everything was looking good! I still didn’t have anymore weight gain, so I’m still around 10 lbs for total gain. Doctor said that was totally fine especially since I am on the low carb diet. I am getting somewhat sick of the diet, but my blood sugars have been pretty good lately, so I am happy about that! The beginning was very stressful mostly because the Joslin diabetes center is used to putting everyone on insulin and they are very very strict. They are also not very “user friendly” and so it was just hard trying to deal with them. Thankfully I was able to avoid insulin though. A few weeks ago I had a really horrible stomach bug that lasted almost an entire week. It was really awful, but since then, my numbers really improved! I’m not sure if it was the illness or just how far along I was in the pregnancy, but it has been much less stressful the last few weeks and I am so thankful for that.

Anyways, the baby was head down so hopefully she’ll stay that way and my doctor was fine with me continuing 2 week appointments until I think 36 weeks when we will start internals and the non-stress tests. They do the non-stress tests for everyone who has GD, but thankfully he was fine with holding off on them till later since I am not on insulin and my blood sugars have been good.

I have also been busy at home getting ready for the baby! We have set up our room for the first few months. I am not sure how long she will stay in the room with us, but it will just depend on when she starts to sleep through most of the night. Thankfully our room is big enough that there is plenty of room for her for as long as she needs to stay with us. Here is a picture of the baby “nook” in our bedroom. I have always hated that blue vanity thing, but it will make for a nice changing table and storage! The dresser was my Mom’s when she was a baby and one half of it is like a little closet where we can hang clothes. And Brandon’s Dad made the cradle when Sammi was a baby and we have used it for all the girls. All the drawers are now full with her clothes and blankets and baby things! So exciting!

Abby is still in her crib and she is an amazing sleeper and napper! So I really did not want to take her out of her crib until absolutely necessary. Plus her crib turns into a toddler bed, so she will probably use it for quite a while still. So, we are so thankful for friends who let us borrow their crib! We set it up in Abby’s room since the baby will eventually share a room with Abby. And I figure the baby can take naps in there during the day when Abby is not napping since our bedroom is awfully far from the living area and I wouldn't really want her sleeping way back there during the day so far away from me.

My best friend made the beautiful pink blanket that is hanging on the crib! It’s amazing and so special! Abby tried to claim it as her “nano” at first, but she now understands it is the babies. She was also not too happy at first that we moved some of the furniture out of her room into our bedroom, but she seems excited now about all the baby things. Maddie and Abby are so cute. They love to open all the drawers in the babies dresser and look at all the cute clothes. Both of them get so excited to do this and have to do it almost every day!

I think we pretty much have everything ready for the baby now! We just have some out door house projects we would like to finish before she comes, but we will just get to as much of that as we can! I can hardly wait for this little girl to be here.

Easter!

2011-04-25T22:40:00.001-04:00

What a glorious Easter! I love Easter so much! The church service is just so joyful and glorious and exciting! It just feels like the whole church year builds up to this one wonderful day of celebrating Christ’s death and resurrection. It is hard to not to feel overjoyed and full of spirit.

And of course the Easter egg hunt is always fun too. We did one with the kids on Thursday. We were supposed to have a few friends come over to do it with us, but some of them were sick. But, we still had one very good friend come and the kids all had a blast. Abby and Dillon are best buddies and are SOOO funny together! And I got to hold baby Morgan almost the whole time, so I was in heaven!

Abby was slow about finding the eggs, but that was mostly because she got so excited when she found one that she would spend a lot of time exclaiming over it! She was so cute!

Sammi found hers right away, but was really good about helping out Abby once she got her eggs.

Maddie of course loved finding eggs too. She took her time as well, but she found the ones that were hidden the hardest!

All the kids with their baskets!

Easter morning was pretty low key. Sammi woke up around 7 and was excited to see if the Easter bunny had hidden the eggs. However, Maddie and Abby just kept sleeping away! Sammi tried to wake up Maddie, but she was just too tired and didn’t want to get up. Sammi was so patient though and was fine with going down to get some breakfast and wait patiently for the others to get up. Finally, everyone was up and we went downstairs to find their baskets and eggs. We try not to overplay the whole Easter bunny thing too much. It just doesn’t seem necessary to me when there is so much joy and excitement at church alone! And even Sammi said to me after we walked past the Easter bunny at the mall last week, “Mom, you know what, I think that is just a person dressed up in a bunny suit”. I said, “well, you know I think you are right Sammi!”. She is no dummy! Anyways, so they each got a chocolate cross, one of those magic coloring books that were GREAT for keeping them happy during the long service! And Sammi and Maddie got nice water bottles that will be great for soccer practice. And all 3 of them got the movie Tangled! We all love that movie! Maddie has cried every time she has seen it! And they found all the eggs that we dyed the day before. I always get nervous that we won’t find all of those! That would certainly stink!

Here are the girls in front of church. Abby was very excited to be wearing the same dress as Maddie.

And one of the whole family!

For dinner we went to my Mom’s house. It was nice to not have to worry about cooking or cleaning. And the girls always LOVE going there! They were being silly and all climbed into one of the beds together.

I love how they thought it was so hilarious!

It was a wonderful Easter and also nice to have Sammi home for a few days. We kept very busy and did lots of fun things while she was off of school. We had the egg hunt, and went to the science center today and hung out with my best friend at the mall on Friday. I’m going to try to blog a little more, so next up will be a baby update!

RIP Ashley 4/11/11

2011-04-18T21:41:00.001-04:00

This is a very hard post to write. I’m sure I will be crying through most of it. A week ago, we had to put our sweet puppy Ashley to sleep. I wrote before about how she had Lyme’s disease and in February her kidney’s were failing. At the time, the vet gave her 1-2 weeks to live. It was very upsetting and our family prepared ourselves as best we could for her death. However, miraculously, she improved over the next few weeks! My Mom made her some special dog food which I think helped a lot and we just tried to take the best care we could of her. She continued to improve and just a few weeks ago she was acting like herself. She was barking at people, bugging us for food and constantly wanting to go in and out. These things tended to annoy me, but now I miss them so much. We took her to the vet about a month ago to recheck her kidney’s and they were improving! The vet had no explanation for why she was doing better, but we are so incredibly thankful that we got to spend those 2 extra months with her. Unfortunately, she somewhat suddenly started to go downhill. About a week before she died, she started to move more and more slowly and had trouble getting up and down the steps. Then, she started eating less and less and last weekend she wouldn’t eat or drink anything. She was very weak and spent most of the day sleeping. On Monday, she laid in the corner most of the day shaking and we just knew it was time. We took some pictures of all of us with her and tried to say goodbye. The girls were of course upset, but they have been pretty prepared for this day, so that helped. Abby did such a cute thing though. While we were all around Ashley, talking about her being sick, Abby all of sudden got up and went to her doctor’s kit, got out the syringe and tried to put it in Ashley’s mouth! She said “Here you go Ashley, here is your medicine!” If only that could have made her all better!

Anyways, it is so hard to believe she is gone. She was such a sweet doggie who just loved everyone. She was CRAZY about balls and just wanted anyone who she met to play with her. She loved and craved attention and we have so many good memories of her. The house seems so empty and eerie without her. I keep thinking I see her laying in the corner, or hear her coming up the steps. It is so easy to take her presence for granted and now that she is gone, her presence is so absent.

She was our first “baby” and here is a picture of her when we first got her! She will be sorely missed, but we can only pray that she is up in heaven, having a blast with her balls and serving a much better master.

28 weeks!

2011-03-24T14:08:00.001-04:00

I guess I haven’t been posting too much about this pregnancy so here is an update!

Today I am 28 weeks. I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes again a few weeks ago. I met with the Joslin center again and started the diet and exercise and testing my blood sugar at least 4 times a day. For the most part my numbers have been good. I am still trying to work out my fasting number, but I looked back at my blog (this is why I need to keep writing on here!!) from Abby’s pregnancy and it seems I had the same trouble at this point and then by 30 weeks my body adjusted and everything stabilized. So I am just praying that the same will happen this time. It can be very frustrating and stressful and I appreciate any prayers!!

I had an OB appointment this week and I didn’t gain any weight in the last 3-4 weeks. My total weight gain is only 10 lbs!! The doctor seemed pleased with that. We heard the heartbeat which sounded good and I was measuring right on track. I usually take the girls with me to these appointments since they are usually pretty quick. Abby gets very excited about hearing the baby and the “ba ba’s”. She taps her chest and says “ba ba, ba ba” mimicking what the heartbeat sounds like. It’s very cute!! The next 2 appointments are 2 week ones and then after that I could be every week depending on how I am doing with the diabetes.

We finished a mini bedroom/bathroom makeover for our master bedroom and started to add some furniture for the baby in there. If you want to see the pics from our makeover you can see them here! At first Abby was not too happy that we took one of the dressers from her room and put it into ours. We plan on setting up the cradle in our room for the first few months and then having Abby and the baby share once the baby is sleeping more through the night. So, today we set up the crib that one of our friend’s graciously let us borrow in Abby’s room and she seemed excited about that. She kept talking about how it would be where her baby sister would sleep. I think she is definitely starting to understand about the baby! Although, yesterday she kept talking about the baby and then said “don’t want to” over and over. I couldn’t figure out what she meant, but then finally got that she meant she didn’t want the baby to come! I asked her why she didn’t want the baby to come and she said “I’m the baby!”. Oh dear!! But, then later that evening she said she DID want the baby to come. I can see there could be some conflicting emotions from her once the baby is born!

A little sunshine!

2011-03-17T12:34:00.001-04:00

Yeah for warmer weather and some sunshine! I know it’s March and these kinds of days are still few and far between, but it was so nice to go to the playground today and soak up some sun! We met some friends there and Maddie and Abby had a great time! Abby was much more daring this year and even went down a slide! I don’t think she would even go in the swings until the end of last summer. But she loves them now! I spent most of my time chatting and pushing the girls and it definitely helped to improve my mood and outlook on life! I hope this trend continues!

Abby’s hair cut!

2011-03-05T11:58:00.001-05:00

I don’t have a great “before” picture…but you can kind of see how straggly and messy her hair looked before. I was putting it up in a pony tail every day, just to make it at least look presentable! We are at the hospital in the picture with Abby’s best bud Dillon, meeting his brand new baby sister! It was incredible to hold her!

And the after shots! It was still kind of wet and so is fuller when it’s dry, but you get the idea She definitely has a lot of hair like Mommy!

From the back…..so much more curl now!

From the front……so much neater and we can probably just get away with just a clip in the front now. I can hardly believe how grown up she is becoming!

25 Weeks

2011-03-03T22:24:00.001-05:00

Today I am 25 weeks! One of my best friends had her baby girl yesterday and it was incredible to hold her today, knowing I would be doing the same in just a few months. I have been feeling pretty good. I would say I probably have felt the best this pregnancy so far, which is kind of amazing considering it’s my 4th and you would think my body would feel more worn out and tired. But, perhaps it is more like a well oiled machine and that is why I feel so good. Anyways, I took my one hour glucose test this week and it was borderline, which is good. However, I still have to do the 3 hour test next week. I have felt so good though, I am trying to be optimistic that I will pass the 3 hour and not have gestational diabetes this time! I know it’s still a big possibility, and hopefully it won’t be as stressful this time if I do have to deal with it. But, I would rather the last 3 months of this pregnancy go as well as the first 6 if I can!

I have definitely gotten bigger in the last month and at my checkup I gained 5 lbs in the last 5 weeks. I think my total from my first appointment is 10lbs., but I know I also gained 3-4 before my first appointment. Last week was the first week where quite a few people at church and in the stores, etc. commented on me being pregnant! Brandon and I went to Lowe’s by ourselves on Saturday since the girls slept over at Grandma and Grandpa’s (Abby did great by the way!). And this couple, who had a crying toddler with them, looked at us and commented “Are you ready for this?!”. I just laughed and said “Oh, we have 3 at home, we have seen it all!”. But, it was nice that it was obvious that I was pregnant and not just a little fatter.

In other news, the vet called today with results from the blood test we did on our dog Ashley. And she is actually improving! The vet said she has no explanation for it and said that almost all dogs with Lyme’s Disease and then kidney failure die within a few weeks. She is still not 100% or really anywhere near it, and so anything could still happen in the next few weeks or months. But, the fact that she is actually improving and not declining is amazing and a true doggy miracle! I seriously don’t know of any other dog who had as much prayers as ours! She is very loved and I believe God heard those prayers. Sammi has been so upset at the thought of Ashley dying soon and so it was nice to tell her today that because of our prayers, Ashley is improving and may live longer than we thought. I told her we don’t know how long she will live, but that we are thankful that for now she is getting better!!

Oh! And it was very impromptu, but Abby had her first big haircut today! We trimmed her hair a tiny tiny bit when she was a year old so it was not in her eyes, but have not cut it since. It was getting SOOO long and very straggly and was getting hard to manage and comb in the morning. I was hesitant to cut it though, because I did not want to lose her baby look. But, we were at the hair cut place and the other girls got their hair cut and I decided at the last minute to just go for it and trim Abby’s hair too. She sat perfectly still in the chair (enticed by a lollipop!) and I am so glad we did it. It is still pretty long, but the lady shaped it nice and it is all nice and neat now and it actually gave her more curls in the back! I didn’t take my camera because it really did happen out of nowhere, but I’ll try to take one tomorrow. And I don’t think it changed her looks too much either. Just makes her look more well kempt.

snow day

2011-03-01T13:29:00.000-05:00

Wow! It's been a whole month since I posted!! I guess either I have had nothing much to post about, or I have been too busy.

Last week, we got about 9 inches of snow somewhat unexpectedly! Our dog Ashley has been having a hard time lately and the vet told us a few weeks ago that they thought she only had a week or two to live. Her kidney's were failing and she was very anemic. It has been a month since then, and she has not gotten any worse, and is probably somewhat better! So, we are not sure what is going on with her now but have an appointment with the vet tonight to re check everything and try to figure out what's going on. She definitely isn't 100% better and still has some strange symptoms, but at least she does not seem to be on her death bed either like we thought a few weeks ago.

Anyway, Ashley LOVES the snow, so it was such a blessing for her to get to have at least one more romp in it! Sammi and Maddie loved playing in it too! I didn't even bother to try to take Abby in it and we went outside when she was napping. When I told Abby to look out the window at all the snow she said "don't like the no (snow)". She had no desire to try to go in it!

But the rest of us had a blast and even I had some fun!

The girls made a slide out of the big pile that Brandon made from shoveling the driveway!

The snow was so deep, that Ashley spent most of her time searching for her ball! Every time I threw it for her, it would just plop way into the snow and she couldn't find it! She would not give up though until she did!

The girls spent a lot of time helping to search for Ashley's ball!

Ashley had so much fun out in the snow! She spent a whole hour out there and didn't even want to go in then! I'm so glad she had this day, especially if she does not get to see another winter.

Sammi and Maddie also made a little snowman! They were so proud :)

Unfortunately, for the snow man, the snow started to melt the next day and amazingly ALL of the snow is already gone now!

Maddie's parent/teacher conference

2011-01-27T23:03:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago we had Maddie's first parent/teacher conference. It went surprisingly well! She has improved SOOOO much since the beginning of the year, that her teacher had mostly all good things to say. Academically, she is doing well with her cutting and knows most of her numbers and letters. At home she really wants to learn how to read, so we have been doing a little phonics with her and practicing some reading. She is actually very close to "getting it" and can sound out some words with help. She just wants to be like Sammi and so wants to read like her and also likes to practice writing her letters all the time since she sees Sammi writing all the time!

Her teacher said she has very good attention span and focus during circle time. And her separation from me and her transitions to new activities has really improved. They used to have to drag her to a new activity, but now she comes along with the rest of the class with no problem. She still does not like to be the center of attention and usually won't say anything for show and tell or when in a group setting and the spot light is on her. But overall, her self image has really improved and she has much more confidence than she did in the beginning of the school year. This week she got to be teacher helper and line leader and you should have seen how proud she was!!

Her teacher also said she is very sensitive and quite and gentle, which we obviously knew! But, it also means she is very helpful and concerned about others. She said that if someone else gets hurt or is upset, Maddie is right there asking what's wrong and is very concerned. Maddie also loves to listen to stories and LOVES any kind of art work or coloring or drawing, which from what I hear, is pretty common for the middle child!

So basically, we will just continue to encourage her to have positive interaction with her peers and continue to nurture her self confidence. I think she will probably always be shy and sensitive and quiet and that's ok! They can be great characteristics to have. We just need to help her learn how to deal with them when she is in a social or school setting. Her teacher was happy to hear that she would be attending the Pre-K class next year and not Kindergarten. I have seen from Sammi being in all day kindergarten what is expected of them, especially in terms of independence and I know that Maddie would not benefit from going next year. Her teacher brought up that she just doesn't have the confidence yet to raise her hand and ask for something if she needs it. Or if she were to get upset about something, she would most likely just sit there and cry and unfortunately probably be made fun of by some of the other kids. I can't imagine her walking down the hall to the office on her own like Sammi does. Or getting her lunch all by herself, etc. When she is at home, her independent skills are great and she is always getting things for me and doing things independently. But, when you place her in a social environment, it is a completely different story. So, I have no problem giving her an extra year to gain more confidence and independence before going to Kindergarten. I would rather her be at the head of the class and doing great than struggling through elementary school because she was sent too early. Plus, I'm just not ready to have her be gone all day!! I love having her with me as my little side kick. :)

Anyways, we are just really happy with how far she has come in the last 6 months. Considering she wouldn't even say a word to the teacher in the beginning of the year, and now she enters the classroom and usually seeks out one of her teachers to tell them something! She has also made some friends and I am hoping to have play dates with some of them soon. It is great to see her playing so easily with other kids her age and telling me all about it later. At Sammi's ice skating lessons this week, she went up to a little girl that she had never met, all on her own and asked to her play! I was blown away!!

Despite the good report, she has been struggling the last month some, mostly due to her schedule being so messed up. She was off from preschool during Christmas break, went back for a week and then was off again for 10 days due to snow and holidays and conferences. So, at home she has been reverting back to having tantrums, giving me a hard time over little things, especially when we would go someplace and even stuttering. It can be very tiring on my patience, but I know that this disruption in our routine is probably the cause and she will most likely get over it soon. And even this last week has been an improvement. I worry about the stuttering and previously the speech therapist told me to call if she started up again for more than two weeks. We are probably going on 2 weeks of the stuttering, but it has been very mild so I am hesitant to call, especially b/c the last time they put us on a waiting list "just in case" we needed the therapy it took 6 weeks before they called asking if we wanted the appointment! So I figure by then I'm sure she will be over all this and hopefully not stuttering. So I think I will just give her more time before attempting anything with the speech therapist. I do wonder about this summer though when she will be hit with a lot of change at once. Sammi will finish school, Maddie will finish school, plus a new baby. I am just wondering if we need to do something to prepare her and teach her how to better handle the stress of change before this summer. The whole point of the speech therapy would have been to help her handle these kinds of situations that do cause her stuttering so that she learns how to deal with them in better ways and doesn't channel it into stuttering. And so every time she has some kind of change thrown at her, the stuttering would be less and she would do it for a shorter period of time.

ANYWAYS, that was a long ramble! But, I suppose I rarely get to post about Maddie! She is such a dear and you should see how she takes care of Abby during the day and how excited she is for the new baby! We just love her to pieces. :)

19 weeks!!

2011-01-23T14:13:00.000-05:00

It's hard to believe I am about half way through the pregnancy!! It is going so fast! So before my little update on the pregnancy, I just had to post this picture of my girls in their Steeler outfits since today is such a big game day! Go Steelers!!!

Funny story.......last week someone sent me a text picture of Tom Brady and then it played this sound of a baby crying. I thought it was hilarious and laughed out loud and showed it to Sammi who saw me looking at it. So, today in Sunday School, I guess they were talking about the game and Sammi told the teacher that I laughed at the man who was crying because he lost the game last week. Then, she wanted to pray for him!!! So my daughter has now prayed for Tom Brady! She is a better person than me! She also told me that they prayed for comfort for the losers of the game today, but let's hope it isn't the Steelers!

Anyways, on to the baby. We had our ultrasound on Thursday!! The baby is measuring exactly right and all of her organs and bones and everything look exactly as they should. They could even show blue and red for where there was blood flowing through the cord and her body. And you could see all the parts of her brain and heart! Pretty neat stuff! I think most of you probably already know, but we also found out it is another GIRL!!!! We couldn't be more happy! I was pretty sure it was another girl and would have been shocked if it was a boy. And the thought of a boy actually intimadated me! So I am somewhat relieved to be having another girl. I feel like I already know what to do, for the most part! And we already have some clothes and other girl things and now the baby can share a room with Abby once she is old enough and we can keep our guest room. So that is really nice. Here are a few shots of her. I had to take screen shots off of the DVD they gave us b/c the CD they gave us was blank. So they aren't the best quality, but at least it is something! Here she is doubled in half, kissing her knees!

Kind of a profile picture

We have been thinking of names and going back to ones that never made the cut for the other girls. It's funny how a name you thought you didn't like now is really appealing! Brandon is extremely picky so it's hard to decide on something we both like. I gave him about 50 names that I liked and he vetoed them all. He gave me about 5 names that he likes and there is really only one that is a real contender for me. We haven't made a final decision yet, but I think we will wait till she is born this time to "announce" her name!

Girl Scouts!

2011-01-12T10:19:00.000-05:00

Last week, Sammi had her investiture ceremony for Girl Scouts and officially became a Daisy! She had to recite the Girl Scout promise and received a special pin!

We started a new troop this year for the kindergarten and first graders in her school since the previous Daisy troop had moved up. There are 5 Moms who are the leaders and we all share responsibility, so starting the troop has gone pretty smoothly so far!

Sammi absolutely LOVES being a girl scout! She loves being social and loves seeing her friends from school at Girl Scouts. I was a girl scout growing up, starting with Daisy's, so I am excited that she seems to love it like I did! It is fun to have something to do together. Maddie and Abby usually tag a long (hence the name of the cookie!) to our meetings, which are every two weeks, so I am hoping they will want to be in it too when they are old enough!

First time in the snow!

2011-01-08T11:58:00.000-05:00

We finally made it out in the snow this morning! I was curious to see if Abby would like it this year or not. She liked it ok last year in December, but hated it in Feb. when we had the big blizzard. She did NOT like it this year either! Her permament place was right by the house, out of the snow, with this unhappy look on her face! She didn't want to go anywhere near it and was even concerned about her sisters being it! She would say things like "Oh no, Nanny fall down!" (Nanny is how she says Maddie). Or "Sammi no (snow) on her jacket!". The only part she did like was watching Ashley play in it. She thought that was funny!

Sammi and Maddie of course loved it!

They had to make snow angels first thing!

They all get a kick out of playing with Ashley in the snow. She loves to catch snowballs right in her mouth and the girls love throwing them at her! We are so glad that Ashley has been feeling back to her old self lately! She is so much better!

I tried to just put Abby in the snow, but it just wasn't going to happen! She just wanted to go inside!

This video cracks me up! Abby's slurping and sighing over her hot chocolate is too funny. She LOVED that part!

Christmas Break

2010-12-31T15:18:00.000-05:00

We were so blessed to have a whole week with Brandon home over Christmas! I have lots of pictures to share, so I will just start with Christmas Eve.

The girls were excited to get dressed up for church! Here is Mommy with her girls

And Daddy with his girls!

Sammi got to dress up as Mary for a little impromptu play they did during the sermon for the Family service. She was VERY excited!

My Mom and Dad and brother came over after our service for pizza and to hang out before they went to the 10:00 service. The girls got to open a couple of little things from Grandma and the presents that my Aunt sent the girls.

The girls LOVED their strawberry shortcake dolls

And Abby was enthralled with Mrs. Potato head! She was busy playing with it all evening! My Mom got her this little headband from central america (I can't remember which country) and Abby insisted on wearing it like this all evening! So funny!

And of course we had to leave out cookies and milk and carrots for Santa and his reindeer.

Christmas morning, Sammi and Maddie sneaked downstairs to see if Santa had come. Then, they came up to wake me and Brandon up very excited that the cookies and milk and carrots were gone! Even Abby got excited! So we all went downstairs to check out our stockings.

Ashley enjoyed opening up her tennis balls too! And I'm not sure how this tradition got started, but somehow baby Jesus from our nativity scene is always found Christmas morning in Ashley's stocking! A little funny I know, but for some reason that has been the tradition for the past few years! The girls think it is great! Sammi has been very good this year about reminding us that Jesus Birthday is the most important thing on Christmas and that Santa is fun, but not as important. And it's not because it is something I tell her all the time, it is just something she knows in her heart. I love seeing how much God has worked in her heart this year. She has become a very generous and caring little girl who really does love Jesus! It is exciting to see the change in her and her joy that comes from it!

Sammi only had two things on her list this year for Christmas. A Zhu Zhu Pet and Dinosaurs! She was thrilled that Santa brought her both.

Maddie and Abby both got Pillow Pets which they were very excited about!

Maddie's big gift from Santa was a highchair and baby doll to go with it. She still LOVES LOVES LOVES to play with baby dolls! She is going to be a great Mommy some day!

Maddie is also all about dresses so she was excited about this Princess dress I found for her.

My big gift this year was a Kitchen Aid stand mixer!!! I was shocked when I opened it! It has been something I always wanted and I can't wait to try it out. It fits perfectly on our counter, so I hope to use it for lots of things.

Later in the day, my Mom and Dad and brother came over for a steak dinner. Yum! We opened more presents with them and they got us some really nice stainless steel pots! Our pots had been from when Brandon was in college and were really worn out, so this was a much needed and appreciated gift. We also got a membership to the Carnegie museums and science center so we are excited to hopefully use that a lot this year. My Mom and Dad are hoping to use it in the summer to take the older girls after the baby is born!

On Sunday, we went to church and I went to a surprise diaper shower! Monday we mostly just hung out and did some errands. Tuesday morning, our good friends from Ohio who were visiting their family in PA, (and who the diaper shower was for!) came to visit us! I think all the kids had a good time! Kids don't always interact while playing at this age, but it was fun to catch up and just hang out while the kids played! Here is Abby with their daughter, who is just a few months younger than Abby.

Brandon also took Sammi and Maddie to the movies Tuesday afternoon. They saw Yogi Bear, which Brandon said was really really awful, but the girls still enjoyed it and had a fun time with Daddy!

Wednesday morning, I took the kids with another good friend to the Children's museum, while Brandon stayed home while our new hot water heater was installed. Our hot water has been smelling like rotten eggs for months, so we were so glad to get that fixed!

One of the highlights was the bubble table!

And they always have fun at the water area!

Abby with her buddy Dillon!

Thursday morning, we went as a family to try out our new membership to the Carnegie Science Center! It was packed because they were also displaying the Stanley cup there that day! But, we still had a fun time.
The girls liked the little train exhibit that was in the front lobby.

Here is the Stanley Cup!

We spent most of our time on the 4th floor where they have all sorts of fun things for ages 2-6, including a water table.

Friday afternoon, we had our annual Holiday get together with some of my best friends from highschool and all of our kids! We were sad some friends got sick and couldn't come, but it is always so nice to get everyone together.

Here are all the girls, eating their pizza!

We tried to get all the kids together! Impossible to get a shot of all of them looking at once!

Sometime during the week, we also went to see the lights at Hartwood Acres, which we really enjoyed. And tomorrow we will probably take down our decorations and then go to my Mom's house for a New Year's Day dinner. Our big New Year's Eve plans will probably just be hanging out at home! It's kind of hard to do anything with little kids and we are worn out anyways from all the fun activities this week!

It has been so nice to have Brandon home all week after he had to work so hard for the past month. Monday will be tough to have Brandon back and work and Sammi and Maddie back in school after I am just getting used to everyone being home! But, we couldn't be more thankful for the time we did have this week. We hope everyone else had a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Christmas - Round 1

2010-12-19T17:57:00.000-05:00

This week started out to be a rough week! Brandon has been working like crazy lately, trying to get a couple of projects out the door before Christmas. So, he was traveling all week back and forth between Pittsburgh and Maryland. He got stuck in snow storms twice and the kids didn't see him all week. Sammi and Maddie both came down with strep throat and on Thursday I had to take our dog to the vet emergency room. She has not been herself for the past 6 months, but our previous vet thought she just had a frayed tendon in her knee. We thought that was what has been slowing her down lately, but a lot of things were still unexplained, like her hair loss and lack of appetite and just in general acting like she was 14 years old, not 7. This week she went from bad to worse and on Thursday she could not even get out of bed. She could barely walk or put any weight on her back legs and just laid in the corner shaking most of the morning. I could not stand to see her in this kind of pain and decided she needed to go to the vet right away. I spent 4 hours at the vet, and thankfully my Mom was able to come watch the kids for me! It turns out Ashley has Lyme's Disease, which you get from deer ticks! We think she got it way back in July when she went with Brandon to his parents cabin. I feel so bad she has been suffering for this long and we did not know why, but I am also so thankful that it can be treated with antibiotics. She was still in pain on Friday, but today she is so much better! She is already acting like herself again and is getting around much better!

Anyways, after such a rough week, we were looking forward to having Brandon's whole family come to visit and celebrate Christmas with us! His Mom and Dad, Sister and her husband and Lily and baby Kayleigh, and his brother Nate and his wife Norma all came and all stayed with us! It was quite the full house but we loved every minute of it! The kids had a great time playing with their cousins and we ate lots of good food and had a wonderful time all being together.

The girls LOVED Kayleigh! They thought she would like some music!

She is such a pleasant and happy baby! And getting so big so fast!

Sammi, Maddie and Lily spent a lot of time in the family room playing with their new toys!

Saturday, after lunch we all opened presents. All the kids got lots of nice things! And we did a gift exchange between the adults and it was fun to see who had who!

Abby was getting pretty tired, but still enjoyed opening her gifts! And of course Ashley had to help too!

Maddie really wanted a hockey stick and net and that's what she got!

The girls had a lot of fun playing with that!

Right in the middle of opening presents, Santa came to our neighborhood on the firetruck! And frosty too! That was quite the excitement!! Abby didn't want to get too close, but at least didn't burst into tears like she did last year!

Sammi and Nana!

And Sammi with Pap Pap and the jewelry box that he made for EACH of the granddaughters! He is so talented and it was such a special gift for them that they will hopefully someday pass down to their daughters!

Sammi, Maddie and Lily all got their hair braided by Aunt Mandy!

We also had a big Christmas dinner with everyone! I think this is about the last year that everyone, including the kids will fit at the table!

Here is one last shot of Kayleigh

And we also tried to get a picture with all the granddaughters! In this one they are at least all smiling....

And in this one they are at least all looking! Too bad I can't combine the two pictures!

We had a such a wonderful time having everyone stay at our house and be together. It was fun to celebrate Christmas a little early too! Brandon has one more week of crazy work, but then we are looking forward to him taking a whole week off and just doing fun things together as a family. It will be really nice to not have to travel this year either!

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Ultrasound Video

2010-12-02T11:41:00.000-05:00

I was able to convert the DVD they gave us at the ultrasound into a video file so I can upload it! I just think it is so neat, but it is a little small and a little long and I am biased. :)

I am 12 weeks today! I can't believe the first trimester is almost over! I am feeling pretty good. The fatigue is starting to fade, or at least is not as severe. I never got sick and just felt naeseous a few times, so I am thankful for that. We have moved on to heartburn now though, which is no fun. But, otherwise I can't really complain! I have been wearing maternity pants for weeks but most of my shirts still fit and I hope to wear them for as long as possible. If you didn't know i was pregnant, you might think I have put on some weight and there is a little baby bump. My pants were tight before I even knew I was pregnant and I felt huge those first few weeks. But, it hasn't really gotten any bigger since then, so now I feel it is more normal for 12 weeks.

Baby Elephant

2010-11-23T08:34:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I had my first OB appointment! I was 10 weeks 4 days. The first appointment always seems to take so long because of all the questions, blood work, etc. And I was a little nervous because my appointment was at 1 and I had to try to get back to Maddie's preschool for her Thanksgiving Feast by 2! Thankfully, I made it just in time! Anyways, the doctor thought that everything felt good and felt like 10 weeks. But, the baby was hiding so she couldn't find the heartbeat. I was disappointed because I really just wanted to know the baby was ok in there! But, I was surprised when she said she would give me a script for an ultrasound just so we could have peace of mind. I wasn't expecting to get an appointment for a few days, but when I called they said they could take me at 4:10 that day! My Mom was already at my house since she was watching Abby during my appointment, so it worked out perfectly so she just stayed and babysat for me some more. I was bummed Brandon couldn't come with me, but that's ok. I was so relieved when our little baby popped onto the screen! And it's heart was beating at 170 bpm, which the tech said was very normal. She said everything looked just perfect! Praise God! It's so amazing to see how much development there is in just a little inch long baby. We got to take home a video, which is pretty neat. You can see the baby moving it's arms and legs like it's swimming!

So, when we showed the video to the girls, I said to Abby "Do you see what's on the screen?" and she said "Elephant!" So I said, "No, that's a baby!" And she said "Yeah, baby elephant!". ha ha! It was too funny. So, apparently we have a baby elephant in there. :) We are just so thankful it is a healthy baby elephant!

Abby's birthday party

2010-11-16T14:50:00.000-05:00

Friday we had a little birthday party for Abby! I am a little bummed because my camera took horrible pictures. I don't know if it was because we were downstairs and the lighting was bad, or I was just trying to take pictures too close or too fast, but almost every single one has some one that came out blurry. We just have a canon powershot camera, so it's not the greatest, but if anyone knows any tricks or settings I should use on it so I get better pictures in these types of situations, please let me know!

Anyways, so Abby was very excited about her birthday. Since Sammi had just had her birthday, I think Abby pretty much understood. If you ask her how old she is, she puts each of her pointers up and says "two"! She can also sing the Happy Birthday song and sings Happy Birthday to Abigial, pronouncing Abigail like Abby gail. It is very cute. So, we had some of our closest friends and family over for cupcakes and presents Friday evening. We decided to keep it simple so Abby could enjoy her time just playing with her friends and not have to try to rush through eating dinner and everything too.

So, the first two pictures came out a little better than the rest. I just love her personality coming through. :)

Here she is with "Aunt" Jen!

And one of her best buddies Dillon. They love to hug and kiss each other and Abby tends to chase him around trying to smother him or tries to get him to tickle her!

Here she is with our friends Kat and Johanna. She also LOVES Johanna and tries to smother her as well! And she loves Johanna's big brother Matthew. Every time she sees a boy his age, she always thinks it is Matthew! She says his name pretty well too!

Cupcake time! We had the kids decorate their cupcakes, at least those who wanted to. Abby just wanted to eat hers! The party was kind of a "zoo" theme since Abby loves animals, so I had the kids could make a little zoo cage on top of their cupcake out of pretzel sticks and put their animal cracker animal on top. I think most of the kids had fun with that!

I got a partial video of us singing Happy Birthday to Abby and you can see how well she did trying to blow out her candles!

Abby thought it was a good cupcake!

Abby was SO excited about her presents! Sammi, the party planner, of course had to help her and her friend Avonlea was so cute and wanted to sit next to her too. She totally got the concept and was thrilled that the presents were for her!

She got so many nice things, including a little people farm from Mommy and Daddy.

And this Strawberry Shortcake remote control car was just too cute! Of course, Sammi and Maddie have been trying to get their hands on that as much as they can!

She also got a bowling set from Aunt Jen and Uncle Dave, which is so cute! And a cookie jar that has cookies with numbers on to practice counting and math. Of course, her teacher Godmother got her that! :) And she got some other little people characters as well. Sammi and Maddie has to sneak down first thing Saturday morning, just so they could play with her new toys before she woke up!

Abby just loved her party and her birthday! She was so happy the whole time and I think she was just kind of stunned that all the attention was on her for once! She loves all her friends and I am so glad she got to spend time with them and just have fun playing and enjoying her birthday!

Report Card

2010-11-15T23:03:00.000-05:00

Abby had a GREAT birthday, which I will hopefully post on later!

But, first I haven't had a chance yet to post about Sammi's first report card and kindergarten parent/teacher conference.

Basically, she is doing great! They don't get a typical report card in Kindergarten, with letter grades, but they give "level" for different skills/concepts. M means they have mastered the skill or concept, W for working toward the skill and N for not yet met. Sammi received a "M" for everything on the report card. It included Math readiness skills, Reading readiness skills, Approaches to Learning, Writing readiness and Print skills. At the parent/teacher conference the teacher explained that they give a "test" to try to evaluate their reading and math skills. I didn't get to bring home the copies of the tests, but some of the concepts/skills for reading were letter identification, letter sound identification, high frequency words, decodable words, rhyming and ryhming production, alliteration, and beginning and ending sounds. Sammi scored 100% on the test and was rated #1 out of her class. She also scored 100% on the math exam and was also rated #1 out of the class for that exam. Her teacher did show me how she wrote her name and said it was some of the best handwriting she has seen. She used a Capital letter for her S and lowercase for all the rest and printed them all very neatly. I have to say, when she does her homework, she can be quite the perfectionist when it comes to writing. She will often have to erase even if the letter goes slightly over the line! It drives me crazy, but I guess I should be happy that she cares about her handwriting :) I just don't want her to think everything she does has to be perfect, but that can be hard with a first born, type A perfectionist, as I know all too well! :)

Anyways, her teacher also said that she is a delight to have in class. She works hard and helps others. She is excited about learning and being friends with her peers. She said she wouldn't change a thing about her! So, that is of course nice for a Mom to hear.

Sammi is really reading well. She flies through chapter books and her writing skills have really improved since she started school. I was worried that since she is pretty advanced, she would be bored in school or it would be too easy. However, I have been really happy with how her teacher and the school has enriched her education. Her teacher asked if we could start an enrichment program at home, which I agreed. She will read books at home either that she chooses or the teacher chooses and then do a little book report on the book. They also have a computer program called I-station that evaluates the kids individually every time they play a game or do an activity in the program. It rates their reading level, and then everytime they go to play a game or read on it, it is at their level. So, say Sammi has a 4.5 reading level and another kid is at pre-k, they will each be given the appropriate level of reading "games", based on their reading level. And the program continually is evaluating the students and adjusting their level. So, that sounded pretty neat. They also break into reading groups every day, called "Titan Time", so she is being enriched during that time with other students who are also advanced. And, her teacher says she is constantly throwing more at Sammi than maybe some of the other students. So, for example, a lot of times their work will give instructions to draw a picture that relates to whatever concept they were learning that day. So, say they learned the word "like" that day, one of the papers might say to draw a picture of something they like. Where some of the kids might need help drawing the picture, or writing the word "like", the teacher will encourage Samim to write a sentence describing the picture. Some of her work has come home with 2 or 3 sentences on it that she has written, with correct puncuation and everything! And her pictures and ideas are always so creative! I love seeing the work she brings home. And I'm thankful that they do send home every single paper they work on, so I can see her work daily. Writing sentences is definitely something she has only started to do since beginning kindergarten and it shows how much she really is learning even though it may seem like she already knows a lot of the material. She basically taught herself to read, so I think it is important that she is learning the techniques behind learning how to read. She really doesn't care that it is easy for her and just enjoys doing the work and learning so much. She takes it all very seriously, which is great!

Sammi really loves school and so far we have been really happy with her teachers and the school. She always comes home excited to tell me what she did at school that day and show me all of her work. In the beginning it was kind of hard to handle all the chaos and excitement that would come roaring through the door! But, things have settled down some now and we have more of a routine, so it is not quite as overwhelming. Tomorrow I am the guest reader for her class, so she is extremely excited about that!

She loves having friends at school and her class seems like it is a really nice group of kids. She plays soccer with a lot of them and we are starting a new girl scout troop this week which we will be a part of! It's also kind of funny that she often tells me that she spends recess playing football with the boys. Apparently, she is the only girl that plays and from what I can gather, "football" means the gym teacher takes turns throwing the football to each of the kids and they have to try to catch it.

Anyways, sorry this is so long. I wasn't even sure I would write about it, but I thought it would be good to record since this is our first real experience in public school!

Happy 2nd Birthday Abigail!!

2010-11-12T08:52:00.000-05:00

I can't even believe that Abby is already 2! It seems like she was just born.

She left the hospital in a preemie outfit, she was so tiny!

It's amazing how much they change in just a year!

And now she is already 2! A big girl, a toddler, no longer a baby. She loves her sisters so much and looks up to them constantly. She is so caring and loves to give out hugs and snuggles, even to people she doesn't know! She loves attention and loves to show off and make everyone laugh and be silly. :) We all love her so much! Happy Birthday Abigail!

Halloween!

2010-11-05T13:06:00.000-04:00

I have so much to post about Halloween! We had two class parties with two parades, plus zoo boo and trick or treating!! I think I"ll just try to give a summary with some pictures : )

First up, Maddie's class party! She was a ballerina. :) She talked about her party all week and was so excited about it!

She did awesome in the parade!

And she liked bobbing for donuts, which was a cute idea. The kids played games and showed off the pumpkins that they decorated and sang songs. Maddie didn't participate too much in the singing, but it was funny b/c Abby ended up singing all the songs and doing all the motions!

Then it was off to Sammi's party! Thankfully they weren't at the same time! She also wanted to be a ballerina. Thankfully, a few friends have loaned us ballerina outfits, so we were all set. This is with one of her best buddies, Emily. Emily's Mom and I recently realized we were in Girl Scouts together! So it's kind of funny that now our girls are good friends!

This is her with the other kids who sit at her table. Although, you can't even see the boys!

And Sammi in her parade!

Abby enjoyed watching the parade with her friend Avonlea!

After the parties, we went to check out Sammi's artwork that was chosen to be displayed in the district offices. It is based on "Where the Wild Things Are". Way to go Sammi!

Sunday morning, we went to zoo boo with our good friends Lisa and her little boy Dillon!

Trying to get a shot of all 3! It was a little chilly, but not unbearable. And the girls had a blast!

Abby and Dillon are already best buds. They are very lovey and were giving hugs and kisses!

I love this picture of Sammi and Dillon!

Sunday night was trick or treating! Here are our ballerina's and a cheerleader! Abby was supposed to wear the pumpkin costume again, but she wouldn't even go near it! So, after 5 years, the trend of someone wearing the pumpkin costume has been broken. I'm sure it will reappear with the next baby though! Anyways, Abby LOVES any kind of sports outfits. She would wear her Steeler jersey everyday if we let her! So, the Pitt cheerleader costume was perfect for her. :)

At least Sammi and Maddie wanted to pose for me this year!

And here's Abby making her "I'm almost 2" face. The tantrums and manipulations are getting into full swing now!

But, she LOVED trick or treating! She even made it all the way the big hill! She hit a few more houses after that, but by then it was getting very cold, so Abby and Maddie decided they had enough. They both made it pretty far though!

Abby was so excited about carrying that bucket around! It's all she could talk about!

Sammi wanted to keep going, so I ended up taking her around the loop then too. She could have gone all night!

This Halloween was jammed packed with activities, but I guess that's what makes it so much fun! :)

Family Fun Night!

2010-10-29T08:32:00.000-04:00

This happened almost two weeks ago, but I wanted to blog about it before all the Halloween activities start! So, Maddie had her family fun night at preschool. I am pretty sure I blogged about this when Sammi had it, so I wanted to make sure I blogged about Maddie's as well. Our whole family got to go and everyone had so much fun!

The teacher read us a clifford story, then we were able to go around the whole school to do various activities. They had so many things set out for the kids! There was a scavenger hunt to find pictures from the clifford book. And the first thing Maddie did was make a leaf for the class tree. She was the first one to put her leaf up! Look how proud and excited she was to show off her preschool to us!

She also enjoyed gluing red things onto Cliffords body to make him red!

And there was a little animal "hospital" set up!

Sammi made a scarecrow

And so of course Maddie had to as well :)

I didn't get pictures of EVERYTHING they did, but this was the last project the girls all did together. We traced Maddie's body, and all 3 girls worked on painting it in to make it look like a tree. They used little cornhusks to paint with. Abby was SOO into it! She just loved painting!

It got kind of messy and the girls were covered in paint by the end, but it was washable and came out so it's all good! I didn't really have a big enough space to hang up this gigantic tree, so we are using it as wrapping paper!

After all the activities, they had a big snack time. (We all brought something). And the girls had way too many cookies and were VERY hyped up by the time we got home! But, it was so great to see how happy Maddie was and how much she really does like preschool. She is progressively doing better and on Wednesday she came bouncing into the classroom all smiles! The teachers commented how different she was from the beginning when she would come into the room with her head down and not even look at anyone. Her teacher said she even painted this week, which she hadn't really done before! She genuinely looks forward to preschool and really does love it, even if she doesn't always show it. So I am very thankful about that! Today, she has her Halloween party and parade and it is all she has talked about all week!

Sammi's 6th birthday party

2010-10-22T16:43:00.000-04:00

Last Sunday, after our get a way, we celebrated Sammi's 6th birthday! Brandon had class on Monday night, so we decided to just do it on Sunday even though we were just getting back from our trip. Sammi has had a big friend party for her 3rd, 4th and 5th birthday parties. Mostly because she is such a big party planner and she would have the whole thing planned out months beforehand! So, we always just went with it and let her invite who she wanted. So, this year, we decided to just let her invite a few friends and to go do something fun and special with them. Some of my best birthday memories are when I just had my best friends with me, plus I just didn't feel up to having a big party at the house or anything, even BEFORE I knew I was pregnant! Sammi was still excited about this idea and so she invited her two best friends Lydia and Caitlyn and we went to the North Park Clubhouse. It is kind of in between a Chuck E Cheese and a Dave and Busters. Smaller than Dave and Buster's, but lots of good food and games for grown ups, plus lots of kids games and all the junky toys that you can get with your tickets, just like at Chuck E Cheese. Sammi really wanted everyone to ride in our van, so we went and picked up Caitlyn and Lydia. They were so cute chatting away and singing songs together. There was LOTS of giggling! You can see that Sammi is STILL riding in her harnessed car seat! She can ride in a booster as well, but she still fits in the harness, so I guess we will keep her there till she gets too big, which will probably be in a few months. Thankfully, we can use her car seat as a booster seat too, so that is good.

Anyways, back to the party! The girls were all so grown up and well behaved at dinner. They each ordered a kids meal and all 3 of them ate EVERYTHING on their plate! I was shocked!! We waited till we ordered our food before we let them go play games and they all were so patient about it. The 3 of them just get along so well! Caitlyn is her friend from preschool last year, and she has known Lydia since she was born since her Mommy and I are such good friends.

Just had a throw a picture of Abby in there! She ate almost an entire basket of fries! She also had a fruit cup, so it wasn't all bad, but she just kept munching away!

So, Brandon and I took turns going over to the games area with the girls and staying at the table while Abby ate and ate and ate. I think they all had fun playing the games!

Then, Sammi opened her presents. She got a pillow pet from Caitlyn (she basically told Caitlyn to buy one for her!!) So, obviously LOVED that. And Cait got her a t-shirt that she can color herself!

And she got an All About Me book from Lydia! She is very excited to start it, but I have to get around to printing some pictures for it first! It is nice b/c she has outgrown her baby book, so I am glad we have something to keep track of these years in. Lydia also got her a Junie B. Jones book, which she also loves!

We also invited some of our closest friends, who are more like family, plus Caitlyn's family to come to the clubhouse later for cake and to open presents. The lighting at the clubhouse wasn't too great, so the pictures aren't the best, but here is one of Sammi with Aunt Jen and Uncle Dave. They got her the new Dora Birthday movie, which she really wanted and some comfy pajamas!

And here she is with her Godmother Lisa and her little boy Dillon. Dillon and Abby will go to school together and Lisa is also expecting a girl who will go to school with our newest baby! They gave her a gift card to Toys R Us with an invitation to take her shopping and out for ice cream! She is a lucky girl to have so many people who love her!

Sammi wanted a Princess cake, so I ordered one from Giant Eagle. It was very good! There was no way I was going to be able to make one since we were away all weekend. Maybe for Abby's birthday I will make one!

Here is a video of us singing Happy Birthday to Sammi. You can hear Abby belting it out in the background! She LOVES to sing and was practicing the Happy Birthday song for weeks! It will be fun to see her reaction on her birthday in a few weeks!

By the end of the party, it was pretty loud and a little chaotic with everyone there, and at one point we lost Abby for about 5 minutes!! I thought she had followed Caitlyn's older sister, Emily, to go play some more games, because she LOVES to hang out with Emily. But, I was wrong and we all started to search the restaurant for her. Every area we would go to, people would say they just saw her walking in this direction but we had just missed her. Finally, after I was starting to get really worried, she came wandering from behind the bar area like she owned the place and she had just been checking everything out to make sure things were running smoothly! She must have wandered the entire restaurant. She didn't seem too worried about it! Yikes! Anyways, overall Sammi had a GREAT birthday party and said it was the BEST day of her life!

On Monday, Sammi got to take treats to school with her and got to bring home the birthday bag and curious george birthday doll! She was very excited and it sounded like they made her day very special at school too. Later, Grandma and Grandpa and Uncle Kevin came over for spaghetti and leftover cake and that was really nice too. She got some Polly pockets from our babysitter and Grandma got her more, so the girls pretty much
just played with those all evening! Here is a picture of her with her polly pockets on her birthday. Abby just had to sneak in the picture too!

Tara

2010-10-21T21:25:00.000-04:00

October is such a busy month for us, I feel like I have a lot to post on!! But, it's hard to find time when during my only free time I just want to sleep! I have been pretty tired, some days being worse than others. But I have had pretty much zero nauseous, so that is nice! I never got sick with the other girls, but still had nauseous at different times of the day. This time, none what so ever!

Anyways, thanks to my wonderful parents, Brandon and I got to get away for the first time since we were married! We went to Tara - A Country Inn which is up near Sharon, PA. It is an old house built in the 1800s which was later turned into a bed and breakfast that is based off of the book/movie "Gone with the Wind". It was very very nice and we loved it!! On the way up, we stopped in Volant, which was a very charming little town and enjoyed some lunch there and just browsing the shops. It was so nice to be in a store and actually get to look at things for once!

We arrived at Tara around 3:30 and the Butler (yes there was a Butler!!) offered us some champagne before taking all of our luggage to our room for us. He gave us a quick tour on the way up just so we would know where things were. I just had a tiny sip of the champagne. When we got to our room, there was this "welcome tray" with our very own personalized cookie!! They had it written down everywhere that it was our anniversary, so all the staff kept saying "Happy Anniversary" to us. It all felt very fancy!

Here are some pictures of the very nice room. There was a fireplace

a jacuzzi tub!

And a very nice king size bed! Brandon and I both like hard mattresses better than soft, and this one had a very soft pillow top on top of the mattress, so we didn't sleep all that great, but it was still very nice.
After dinner, they even came and turned down the covers and put chocolates on our bed!

Look at this neat towel holder by the tub!

After we settled in, it was time for afternoon tea! They offered us all sorts of cookies and sandwiches and it was all very good. I had to get a shot of this lady in the picture below b/c of her outfit! She was all dressed up like she was in the movie or something. You can't see the back of her dress, but it poofed WAY out! It was kind of funny b/c then her husband, who was next to her was just wearing a t-shirt and jeans!

This was supposed to be a replica of Scarlett's room from the movie and it had some real items from the movie in it.

The garden outside was very pretty and it was a gorgeous day, so we went for a very nice walk on the grounds.

Here is Brandon in front of Tara!

And me!

They also had a hospitality hour which was basically just cheese and crackers and some kind of drink which we couldn't really figure out what it was. And then we had dinner in one of the restaurants there, called Stonewall Tavern. It was the more casual choice, but still very good food and service. And in the morning, we also had breakfast in the other dining room, which was also included in our package! We felt so pampered all weekend and the package they offered really was a lot of food and service. It was so nice to relax for the weekend and not worry about getting anyone ready or dressed but ourselves or listen to any whining or crying. On Sunday after breakfast, we even snuck in a nap (I was SOOO tired!) since checkout wasn't till noon. And then we had lunch at Buffalo Wild Wings on the way home so we could watch the first half of the Steeler game. We only stayed one night, but that was plenty and I did miss the girls by the time we got home. Apparently, they didn't miss us too much though and had a great time with Grandma and Grandpa at the pumpkin farm. Even Abby didn't ask for me or cry or anything! So, we are glad it all went so well and hopefully we can return before another 7 years go by!!

Happy 6th Birthday Samantha!!!

2010-10-18T14:10:00.001-04:00

I can hardly believe our sweet little Sammi is already 6 years old! It feels like we are starting a new era with her. She reads, she goes to school, she has a mind of her own, she has her own friends and most likely she remember most of her life from here on out. We are so proud of who she is becoming and thank God for her everyday!
Also, Happy Anniversary to Brandon!! Sammi's birthday always seems more important than our anniversary, but we actually got to get a way this weekend for the first time since we were married and had a really great time! I will post on that later! Here is a little photo collage of Sammi through the years.

Exciting News!

2010-10-12T20:22:00.000-04:00

I didn't want to post this on facebook before posting it here first. I wish I could tell some of you in person this news, but since the ones I am thinking of live far away, this will have to do :)

We are expecting Baby Walker #4!!! We found out on Friday, October 8th. I had some very very light spotting on the 6th, and thought I was getting my period. But, nothing more happened and that has never happened before! So, I decided to just take a pregnancy test to make sure and there was a faint line! Right after, I took the kids to CVS so we could all get our flu shots and so picked up another digital test just to make sure I wasn't seeing things. And it was definitely positive! I knew there was a chance we could be pregnant, but I really wasn't expecting it! So I was kind of surprised when it was actually positive! I just couldn't wait to tell the kids, so we told them that evening. If something does happen to this baby, I would want them to know, so there wasn't really any reason to keep it from them. Sammi and Maddie were so excited! Sammi just keeps giving me big hugs and telling me how happy she is. Maddie is very excited as well and where Sammi says she wants a boy, Maddie says she wants a girl! She said it's because she wants Abigail to have a little sister to play with. Isn't that sweet! :) I think Brandon and I will just expect it's a girl, and that way if it's a boy we will be surprised and if it's a girl, it will be what we expected :). I told the girls i that because I have a baby in my tummy, I might not feel too good or I might be more tired and that I might be needing their help. Sometime on the weekend, Sammi went downstairs and cleaned up the whole family room without me even asking. She said she wanted to help me out because of the baby! What a sweetheart! And since then, Maddie has also cleaned up for me without even asking! They are both so helpful :)

When I said to Abigail, "Would you like a little baby brother or sister?" She said "Ok!" and then ran downstairs to get a baby doll! ha! So I don't think she quite gets it yet. But, she will be 2 1/2 by the time the baby is here and for Maddie that was the perfect age, so hopefully it will hold true for Abby as well. She does love babies almost as much as Maddie, so I think she will do just fine.

We are pretty sure the due date is mid-June. It could even happen on Sammi's last day of school! I am a little nervous about starting the summer out with all 4 kids, all day long, but hopefully having Sammi around will be a big help. I have been feeling pretty good overall so far. A little nauseous, and a little tired, but nothing horrible yet. I am already starting a low-carb diet and exercise with hopes to "beat" gestational diabetes. Whether I test for it again or not, I figure it doesn't hurt to eat healthy and exercise now.

It is still really hard for me to believe that I could have 4 kids before I even turn 30!! Wow! I do not want to take this baby for granted though and very much appreciate any prayers. :)

Maddie's sweater!

2010-10-11T09:46:00.000-04:00

I finished another sweater for the girls this week! It was an impulsive start b/c I just thought it was so cute in the book and I already had the yarn and needles, so I just kind of started it on a whim! You had to continue a rather long, complicated pattern throughout, in order to make all those little hole darts, so it was a little more challenging than other projects. But I think I prefer this kind of project rather than one where the pattern is boring and simple and tedious. It is hard to see the pattern when the sweater is on Maddie and the picture of the sweater in the book definitely looks better than mine!! But, Maddie loves it and that's all that matters! When I started it, I thought it would be for Abby, but once it again it turned out too big! Actually, this time the measurements came out almost right, so I didn't really make it too big. I just think the book sizes run really big. Except for the sleeves, which for some reason were coming out WAY to long and I ha to edit the pattern a bit towards the end before they got any longer! Oh well, easy enough to roll them up! So, Maddie gets to wear it this year and Abby can wear it next! It is nice and puffy and big and looks really comfy. I only had 3 white buttons on hand, so I still need to add 2 more, but who knows when I will get around to buying buttons! But, I think for a free sweater that had lots of love put into it, it turned out pretty nice :)

Update!

2010-10-05T20:55:00.000-04:00

It's been too long since I last updated!!

A few weeks ago, we went to Virginia to meet our newest neice, Kayleigh Rose! I posted most of the pictures on facebook, so I will just put few here. All the girls loved to hold her, but Maddie especially did.

She would have just sat on that couch and held her all day if she could have! She would just look at her so lovingly and is such a little mommy.

Abby really loved to hold her too, almost as much as Maddie! She would stroke her hair so gently and just give her cute little looks and kisses.

Sammi liked holding her too, but she mostly enjoyed just playing with Lily! Those two are a lot alike and both have a lot of energy, so they always have a good time together.

Preschool has been going ok for Maddie. She seems to like it, and tells me all about it when she comes home, but still will not participate or really say anything to the teachers. The teacher said snack time was becoming an issue b/c the kids are supposed to say "yes, please" or "no, thank you" and they can't get Maddie to say a word. They don't really care if she says please or thank you, but now the other kids, especially the girls are picking on Maddie saying why doesn't Maddie have to say it when the rest of them do. So, this week they got Maddie at least nod her head yes or no as some kind of communication. She has also been peeing her pants at least once a week at school b/c she doesn't want to tell her teachers she has to go. So I am going to just try to take her to the bathroom right when we get there and the teachers said they will remind her. But, even if we solve these issues, I don't think she really plays with the other kids or participates. She does do some of the art projects, but no group activities. I guess I just need to give her more time, but I'm just worried that maybe the class is too big and she needs a better teacher/student ratio. The teachers are really good with her and do seem to know how to handle her, so maybe I just need to give it more time. I am hoping to talk with the teacher more over the next few weeks to see how she thinks Maddie is doing. Without Sammi around during the day, Maddie has actually become a lot more independent at home and very helpful. I think she feels more in charge and in control when she is the oldest one at home! I guess she does not feel that way at school though and tends to just shut down and hide in her little shell. I feel at a loss about what do for her schooling wise in the future b/c what is working for Sammi, may not work for Maddie. But, I guess we will just take it one year at a time! Anyways, that's my preschool update!!

Sammi, on the other hand is still loving kindergarten! It is a little crazy when she gets home just b/c of all the excitement that goes on. This week was a little better, but usually we have papers flying everything and Sammi talking a mile a minute about her homework and just everything that went on that day. It can be a little overwhelming to introverts like Maddie and me! But, I am trying to get her to take her papers right to the kitchen and then show me one thing at a time and then give her a half hour or so to just rest. And that has been working better.

Her creativity has really sparked lately and she has started to write stories!
Here is a video of her first written story. She wanted to give it to her teacher, so I wanted to take a video of it so I could remember it in the future. I'm not sure where she came up with a Dragon, a mug and a turtle for a story, but I guess you could say it's original! She spells a lot of things incorrectly, but if you read it phonetically, it makes sense. Although for some reason on here the video quality is not too great. She wrote another story yesterday, and this time I went through and showed her the correct way to spell some of the words. The next time she went to write a few of those words, she remembered the correct spelling, which is great! She is also reading like crazy and loves chapter books. This morning when I went to get her up for school, I found her downstairs reading! What a little bookworm! She has such a love for learning and just absorbs information like a little sponge!

And we can't leave out our little, spunky Abigail. She is definitely the comic of the family. She is always making us laugh! Here is a video of some clips I took at dinner tonight. One minute everyone was crying, and the next we were all cracking up at Abigail! I love how Maddie could hardly breath she was laughing so hard!! Abby knew she was making us laugh and just loves to eat up the attention! Such a little ham! We can hardly believe she will be 2 soon!

Preschool and Speech

2010-09-12T17:56:00.000-04:00

So, Madeline had her first day of preschool last week! She is in the blue class and has it every Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoon. She has been excited about it and we talked about it a lot before she went. Once Sammi was in school all day, I think she was really eager to be big like Sammi and also go to school! So, Wednesday they split up the class and half went from 12:30 -1:45 and the other half went from 2 -3:15. That way it is less kids the first day and it is just enough to meet the teachers and see the classroom, etc. So, anyways, Maddie was very excited up until we actually go to the classroom. We were early, so we were waiting in the hallway outside the door till the teachers were ready for us to come in. More and more people came and were waiting with us and Maddie just got more and more overwhelmed. She started crying and I wasn't sure how well this was going to go! But, once we got inside the room, she saw the whole corner that had tons of baby dolls and baby doll furniture and she calmed down. Having that area for her to play in when she first comes in is so helpful! She LOVED playing with the baby dolls and was ok when I left her. The rest of the hour went ok. I don't think she said a word to anyone and she didn't want to eat her snack or participate in anything. But, she was smiling when I picked her up and I was so proud of her for doing it! I wasn't sure what to expect on Friday, but Maddie actually did really great!! I peeked in the window when I came to pick her up and she was talking with other kids and even asked the teacher something! She told me she even ate some of her snack! For those of you who don't know her that well, that was huge!! I think one of the reasons she did so well was because she was so familiar with the surroundings and the routine just from being there when we picked up Sammi every day last year. Sammi never had the teachers Maddie has, but she seems to really like them and I think they are very understanding and patient which is good for someone like Maddie! Maddie also just feels so big and proud because it is now HER preschool! Anyways, I just couldn't be more thankful at how well she is doing this early on. After our bad experience with dance camp, I was so worried that her teachers wouldn't be right for her or that she was just be too overwhelmed by it all and we wouldn't even get her in the door. But, God is good and answered our prayers and it is hard to believe how grown up she has become!

She insisted that Abby her match her on her first day of school! They were so cute posing together!

Anyways, Friday morning we also had Madeline's long awaited speech evaluation! When we got there, the evaluation rooms were all taken so we just went into the doctor's office where he had some games and toys. The doctor asked me a bunch of questions first just about her speech and how long she has been stuttering, etc. I explained to him that it seemed to come and go for long periods of time. She had been stuttering almost every sentence from about May till sometime in August. It seemed like the stress of Sammi being home from school and our routine changing is what triggered it that time . But, for the past 3-4 weeks she finally got over it and has hardly been stuttering at all! So, after we talked, he wanted to hear Maddie talk. Well, she was totally shy and wouldn't say a word! We tried playing a game together and getting out Barbies and she would smile a little, but it was really hard to get her to talk. Finally the doctor was going to suggest that maybe I would have to video tape Maddie at home and send it to him. The idea of that totally frustrated me and I really was hoping we wouldn't have to do that! But, then he had an idea and brought back a little microphone thing so that he could leave the room and listen on his end of the walkie talkie thing on the other side of the door. Well, as soon as he left the room Maddie opened right up!! Her and I spent the next 15-20 minutes just playing games and Barbies and she talked a lot. Whew! When the doctor came back, he said that out of 100 words she only stuttered 5 times so there was no reason to do speech therapy right now. If something triggers it and she starts to do it again for more than 2 weeks, then we should call him and come back to do speech therapy once a week. The goal would be to shorten those periods when she does stutter so that eventually she can get through stressful periods without stuttering. He explained that stuttering was actually genetic and that Maddie's is just genetically wired to stutter when she is vulnerable. Some kids in stressful situations have other vulnerabilities, like potty issues or tantrums and well to be honest, Maddie has those tendencies as well. But, she also has stuttering. So, I feel really good about the diagnosis and therapy recommendations. I am so glad we don't have to do anything right now and I really really liked the doctor and how he worked with Maddie, so if we do have to go back at some point, I feel really good about going back to him. I feel so much relief now about the whole thing and I am really glad we went and got some answers. Hopefully, Maddie just continue to grow and blossom! We love her so much!