Nathan's 5th!

June 24th, 2012 we celebrated our little man Nathan Eli. Yep, we have a  5 year old once again! We had a camping theme for his backyard party. Sad to say we hadn't used our tent since Kiera was 1 month old. 

Here's the set up. 

We BBQ'd hamburgers and hotdogs and used our little bbq to roast marshmallows and made smore's with brownies instead of chocolate bars (this was instead of cake and ice cream). Those were SUPER yummy!

We played games after the smore's to try to run some of the sugar off. ;)

 Some good ol' Simon Says

Some relay racing

 Nathan needing a break

 Potato Sack (pillow cases) Races

 And then the presents

The plan was for our family to camp out back that night but after baths we decided to sleep in our own beds and then do the camping thing the next night.

Some bedtime stories 

Lovies in the morning!

The kids wanted to camp again the next night but we decided to take the tent down so the grass wouldn't die.

It was great and I know we'll be doing more backyard camping again. :)

Baby Blake-Birth Story

I better write about Blake's birth before I forget any of the details! If you don't want to know, don't read this. :)


Tuesday, April 24th I went to my prenatal appointment and Robert was able to go with me since he had started vacation over the weekend. He hadn't been to the doctor's with me since my first prenatal back in November. My midwife checked me and said I was 2-3cm dilated but my cervix was still tucked toward my back.


So Robert and I got lunch and then went to Disneyland for a little bit. I actually was feeling pretty good, better than I had felt a couple weeks before when we had last taken the kids to Disneyland. I got to ride on the new Star Tours for the first time and we met a talker who knew numerous random facts in the Buzz lightyear line.

I lost my mucus plug when we got to my parent's to pick up the kids.
After we got home we were up that night talking and hanging out until about 2am. I was tired!


Wednesday, April 25th (my due date!) I woke up to a contraction around 5:20am. I went to the bathroom and then laid down and went back to sleep for about an hour. I woke Robert up at 6:30am and told him I was having contractions. He said we should call my mom but I told him I wanted to take a shower first and call her when I got out.
I got in the shower around 7am and had a ton of contractions while I was in there but the hot water on my back and leaning forward helped a lot. Robert was still sleeping when I got out and Domenic was right next to him totally out.
This is how the texts went with my mom
Me: Hey Moma. I'm having contractions. Just got out of the shower.
Mom: Ok. How close?
Me: Not sure I just sat down. I'm going to time them. Fairly close it seems.
Mom: Ok. Hard? When do you want me there?
Me: They kind of vary in how hard they are.
Mom: Yea. Sorry for the late night babe.
Me: Robert said you should probably come sooner than later. So whenever you're ready. :)
Mom: Ok be there soon!


Nathan walked in and got on the bed with Robert and Domenic. Robert told Nathan to stay close to Domenic so he would stay asleep.

I finally got dressed and kept having to lean forward during contractions (it felt better that way). I tried to eat a granola bar but after 2 bites I couldn't eat anymore. I also tried to go pee one more time before we left, when my mom got to our house but I couldn't.


My mom got to our house about 8:15am. Kiera had woke up while I was in the bathroom and started crying because she thought I had left already. Fortunately I hadn't and she gave me a big, gentle hug. Love my sweet girl!


I was having trouble walking but made it to the car.
Robert put our "In Labor" flag on his car and called the hospital on our way. They asked what baby number this was and after he answered "4" they said, "ok, see you soon". That made me laugh. I guess they figure you know you're in labor by number 4. {the In Labor flag flew off sometime during our drive}


We got to the hospital and parked in a good spot. I got out of the car and told Robert that I didn't think I could walk that far now, though I had told him to park there. So we got back in the car and he pulled in to the drop off and went inside to get a wheelchair. This was about 9am.
I didn't realize there were tiles all in the entry area of the hospital until he was rolling me over them. Oh man! I had him stop as I had another contraction in front of the gift shop. After that one was over I looked over to my side as the older gentleman in the waiting room was looking at me with a sympathetic expression.


We got to triage and they asked me if I could give them a urine sample. I said no. I got my clothes off, got the gown on, made it up onto the bed and laid down on my side for the nurse to check me. She said ok she's ready as she told the other triage nurse "she's fully open, plus 2 with a lip" (I think that was from my bladder).


They rolled my bed into the labor and delivery room right up to the bed I was suppose to lay on. The nurse was trying to lift/push me onto the other bed as she's telling Robert that I need to get on the other bed. I'm whispering "hold on" and Robert's telling her to hold on. After I finish with that contraction I crawl to the bed I'm "suppose" to be on. The nurse wants me to scoot down and put my legs up, I asked her, "can I push now?" She said, no that she'd prefer the Doctor was there first so I told her if I lay down the baby will come out. She replied "ok".


I was watching the nurses get everything ready and together, hearing them say, "we need a provider in here!" Finally a female doctor walked in (it had only been a few minutes but seemed like a while) who was suppose to be working triage but was pulled in to delivery my baby. She introduced herself to me, which I still keep forgetting her name, fortunately it's on my paperwork. She had me push, then she used a catheter really quickly (she warned me seconds before) which burned and then broke my water. She was very calm and I focused on the instructions she was giving me while holding on to Robert's hand and feeling his body inches away from my right side.


I hear, "It's a Boy!" as they laid him on my chest. Our little BOY was born and barely cried and he was just perfect! Robert said he looked at the time and it was more like 9:25 but his official birth time is 9:28am. :) I remember saying right after, "I'm thirsty!".

 Right after they weighed and measured him

 7 pounds 10 ounces 20 1/2 inches

He's just perfect!

Robert leaned in and gave me a kiss, asked if I was ok and then said he needed to sit down because he thought maybe he forgot to breathe and was feeling light headed. As the doctor is giving me stitches for my second degree tear (she said from everything happening so quickly) about 2-3 nurses head over to help Robert with ice packs and fanning. I guess one of the nurses used smelling salt on him which is what pushed him over the edge as he asked for the trash can to throw up. The Doctor asked if that was pretty normal for him and I kind of laughed and said, "no, this is the first time". Consensus was everything happened so quickly and the adrenaline was pumping that caused the queasies. I'm sure it was a funny sight as I'm getting stitched and asking "you ok Babe?" 


They gave me a shot of pitocin after the placenta was delivered and then less than an hour later the nurse gave me another shot of pitocin because she said I was still bleeding more than I should have been. We actually got to stay in that room for a while before being wheeled up to the recovery room. They gave me an IV after I had the baby and every time [I'm in the hospital] I tell them my veins are better in my arm than my hands, but no, they insist on trying to get one in my hand. The nurse tried in my left hand, then she tried in my right hand, then she asked the other nurse who got a smaller needle and I reiterated that my arm was a better choice, so she tried there and got it on the first try. I was given a second bag of fluids while I was in recovery.


My midwife who I had seen me throughout my whole pregnancy came in and said she was sorry she missed my delivery, she was delivering another baby at the time. {Oh and the other Doctor was doing a c-section for twins}. She also wanted to know how much he weighed because she was thinking I was going to have a 6 pound baby. I had been measuring small my whole 3rd trimester which is normal for me but she sent me for an ultrasound at 35 weeks and was concerned every week after she measured me. She even wanted me to have a milkshake every day. Which I did for about a week until my body rebelled and didn't like anything I ate and got it out of my system quickly.


We checked in about 9am Wednesday morning and checked out at 12pm Thursday. Some of you already know that I was really desiring to have a home birth with a midwife but that was not God's plan for us this time. I was very sad about this and was actually dreading driving to the hospital (tears on numerous occasions). But He TOTALLY blessed me and took great care of me throughout the whole hospital stay. I had some great nurses who respected me. I had midwives deliver my other 3 kids so this was the first Doctor delivery that I had and she was awesome. God knew exactly what I needed and when I needed it. I am in awe of His grace and compassion toward me. He is an awesome God!


In the afternoon on the 25th we pulled out the list of names that we had made. There were about 5 names and I told Robert to pick his favorite 3. He said he only liked 2 and so I told him I only liked 1 out of those 2. Our 3rd little man was given the name Blake (dark; dark hair) Levi (honorable son) and his brother's and sister adore him.

2 weeks old

Mourning Cloak

Robert called me out front and showed me this! It was right under our bedroom windowsill. 

So I ran back inside to grab my camera :)

I think this might be a butterfly caterpillar! (we get a lot of moth caterpillars)

After going back inside we looked it up and was pleased to discover that it was in fact going to be a Mourning Cloak butterfly. Yay! The plan was to put it in the habitat once it was totally inside it's chrysalis.

The next day it was not there, we thought maybe a bird got it or something. :( But then a couple days later my mom found it on our driveway. :) So we put it in our butterfly habitat and waited.

I think it was about 3 weeks when Kiera was sitting at the kitchen table working with the cuisinair rods when she heard a fluttering. She pulled the next down from the top of the bookcase and came to tell me "it IS the butterfly Moma!"

The right hindwing was still curled and there were a couple small holes on the right forewing. So I told Kiera that this butterfly might not be able to fly but it sure was thirsty.

It would get stuck on it's back so I would help it turn over. Poor butterfly. :(

I told Kiera, "look the butterfly is looking at you" She smile. :)

We tried to release it but it would just crawl to the top of the net and then fall to the bottom. Our little butterfly only lived about 4 days.

We did learn that the Mourning Cloak butterfly is an early spring butterfly and that it hibernates as a caterpillar during the winter. 

Backyard Baseball 4-2-2012

It's always a special time at our house when daddy gets home. The kids are excited, mommy's excited and I'm pretty sure daddy's excited too.
Our children have a great daddy. He makes time to talk and play with them even if for only 15 minutes.

 He is also a very patient man!

Oh so blessed!

Anniversary Week! {2-26 to 3-3}

Hi! It has been a while since I've posted anything and I've been thinking about it and I really didn't have much to say. So I didn't say anything I guess. But I did want to write about this past week before I forget!

Robert took a vacation for the week and we celebrated our 8 year anniversary. :)

On Saturday night Kiera told me our schedule for daddy's vacation week. I like how she planned something and then had a "break/off day" between each activity. She's a good little organizer. ;)

Robert's vacation started on Sunday. My mom watched the kids for a few hours while Robert and I went for a drive. I was looking for some photo shoot spots and had some places in mind. We stopped to grab food for me, then a while later we stopped to grab food for him. We did find the place that I want our family photos taken at! On our way back we stopped at a mattress store which made me sleepy because you have to lay down to see if the bed is comfy. haha sleepy pregnant lady here!

Found some tracks, thinking raccoon

Those are some nasty claws that I would not want to come in contact with.

What do you see? A triceratops? 

We thought this place was pretty cool. I think the kids will like it.

Monday was our break-off-day so we did school, did laundry and dishes and picked up around the house and went grocery shopping. It was nice just being all together. Robert ended up making dinner because my back started hurting a whole lot during our shopping trip. I guess pushing two boys in a Costco cart could be a little strenuous but I didn't really think much about it since the cart wasn't full. Note to self... do not have abs of steel...
It also rained!

We heard it start to sprinkle so everyone grabbed their rain gear... as you can tell they were waiting for it to start raining. The sprinkling had stopped when they had gone outside.

Now it was starting to sprinkle. And within minutes it was pouring!

Domenic was the first one to come in. He was cold.

Tuesday, we went up to the snow just past Wrightwood to the Mountain High Ski Resort in the Angeles National Forest. Yay for real snow!!! It had just snowed 6" the night before so that was perfect timing. We don't have snow gear so we brought the kids rain boots. The plan was good but we did not forsee the snow falling into the boots, thus still resulting in freezing toes. Oops. They needed snow pants to go over their boots to prevent that from happening. Maybe next time! The kids got to see a real ski lift just like we had seen in our Curious George book and snow boarders doing tricks. Of course they built a snow man with Robert's help. Actually I think it was a snow lady. The kids (and daddy) got to throw snow balls! So fun! Just the month before was the first time the kids (and Robert) had actually seen and touched real snow but it was mostly ice. So this was the very first time they got to actually sink into the snow and the highlight for Kiera was being able to make snow angels. :)
In the evening we all went out to the softball game and watched Robert play. We don't go out to see daddy play very often so this was a fun ending to our day.
Oh, did I not mention that it was our 8 year anniversary this day! Yep! Spent the whole day all together with all my loves. Robert and I have been together for 11 years, which doesn't seem like very long but so much has happened, so many wonderful things in this short amount of time. I love being the head coach for the manager God gave me, while training our little team players. ;)

hehe

Haha Nathan wanting to throw a BIG snowball at Robert

Robert bombed him with a big snowball before Nathan had the chance to throw his.

hehe

And then Robert got Kiera who said, "Mom! Where are you? I can't see! It's coooold!"

:)

Team work on the base of the snowman

Thought this was cute!

Nathan at the ready with a snowball

Their snow lady. I had given Domenic my gloves because they were dry.

Kiera's snow angels

The drive home as we were coming down the road.

Watching Robert play softball

Wednesday was suppose to be another break-off-day but I ended up going to the doctor's for a rhogam shot and blood test that I was suppose to get a few weeks ago and they felt like I shouldn't wait any longer and then Robert had a doctor appointment with the podiatrist. So we called it our half-break-off-day.

My viewpoint while I was trying on a dress that I had bought when I first found out I was pregnant with Nathan.

Thursday the the other half-break-off-day so we did stuff at home again and then we went to the library. I had been needing to go to the library for a couple weeks and when we finally went the 2 books I was looking for weren't there. Despite that it was still a successful trip and we got some neat books.
Truthfully I couldn't remember what we did on Thursday. I had to ask Kiera. haha

Friday we read a lot of our borrowed books and then went to Disneyland in the afternoon. We all had a good time after the initial crying. Domenic fell asleep, Nathan didn't want to go on the Jungle cruise ride, his crying made Domenic wake up and start crying and then Mommy said "let's go home!" and then Kiera started to cry. Robert had a little talk with the boys and the rest of the time there was enjoyable. The boys and I got some good seats to see the Soundsational parade while Kiera and Robert jumped on a couple rides together. They joined us right before the parade started.
I told the kids during dinner that night that they were lucky they had a nice daddy to give them a second chance today because mommy would have taken them home and that would have been the end of our disney trip with all the crying. They looked at Robert and said "thank you daddy!"

Kiera wore her wings and dressed like Fawn.

She wouldn't look at the fairies while they were talking to her. She answered them but she was being all shy. I thought that was pretty cute because she's usually not.

She posed this way because they told her that's how Fawn would stand. :)

Saturday was Robert's last day of vacation. We got up early to head to the Whittier Pregnancy Care Clinic to participate in their annual Walk 4 Life. Nathan walked half and Kiera walked the whole way. Domenic just chilled in the back seat of the stroller. Before the walk started Kiera got a butterfly painted on her face while the boys and I decorated a sign to hold while we walked. Our sign said Jesus <3's You and had foot prints and hand prints and other drawings the boys wanted to add to it.

Robert got a picture of Kiera before she took a bath.

That was our fun family week!

Oh! One thing I forgot to mention was we finished our taxes before their due date! Seriously, we usually are rushing to get our taxes postmarked on the final filing date. Last year I even had to drive to Robert's work so he could sign the papers before I mailed them. So it only took us 8 years to finally get them done early and I told Robert it's because this year we did not say "we'll get our taxes done early".