One Month Old!

Grace turned one month old on November 17th.  (We've survived our first month as a family of 5!)  Grace is still in the sleepy newborn stage, and spends most of the time sleeping, but is starting to have more awake time.  She had her two week checkup, and weighed 7 lbs 8 oz and was 21 inches long.  She is still wearing newborn clothes.  Here are some pictures from month number one!

One Month!

Meeting Great Grandpa and Grandma!

Wide awake!

Sisters!

First bath

Everyone helping with the first bath :)

Sweet girl

Meeting Grandpa!

Grandma, Kyler, & Grace

Sound asleep

3 Days Old

Pumpkin Carving

So, we actually ended up carving our pumpkins after Halloween this year instead of before. :)  Shhhhh don't tell! :)  It just didn't happen before hand, and the kids still wanted to do it, and I thought it would be fun, so we did it after.  Here's our pumpkin carving 2013!

Watching Daddy cut it open

It was stubborn!

Grace during pumpkin carving :)

We got it! (Ignore Erik's "crazy eyes") :)

Kyler sticking his hand in

Norah touching the seeds

Daddy carving the eyes.  The kids and Erik had a long discussion about what they wanted the face to look like. :)

All done!

Glowing nicely!

Halloween 2013

I knew Halloween was going to be a bit tricky having a newborn to take with us.  But I wanted to make sure that the "big" kids still had fun since they completely understand what Halloween means.  We started the day visiting one of my college roommates that was back in town for the week.  After lunch we took naps, and then got ready to head out to one trick-or-treating stop before supper.  Before we left, we took some quick pictures of the kids all dressed up in their costumes.

 My ice cream cone and Twins baseball player :)

Trying to get a picture with Grace :)

Our first stop was to my (Ashley's) old babysitter's house.  Henry and Geneva also got to meet Grace for the first time.  Here are some pictures from the first stop:

Henry and Geneva meeting Grace, love their facial expressions. :)

Henry and Geneva with all three kids!

After Henry and Geneva's house, we came home so that Erik's parent's and sister could stop by and "trick-or-treat" and see the kids in their costumes.  After they left, we had a quick supper and handed out some candy here before we left to go around our neighborhood.  As soon as we were done with dinner, we got everyone ready to go and headed to a few houses on our block.  As soon as we were done with our neighborhood, we loaded up in the car one more time to head over to Ashley's parent's house to trick-or-treat there.  Here are a few pictures from that stop:

Our Ice Cream Cone and Twins Baseball Player :)

Hanging with Uncle Ben

Miss Grace sound asleep :)

That was our final stop of the night, and as soon as we were done, we returned home.  It's fun to watch as the kids are getting older and understanding the meaning of the holidays and what you do.  Norah decided she wanted to go trick-or-treating again on Friday night. :)  We reminded her that this only happens one day each year. :)

Grace's Newborn Pictures

Here are Grace's Newborn Pictures:

More Grace

Here are just a few more random pictures from our time in the hospital with Grace.

Grandma Nadene

Uncle Ben and Kyler

Family of five :)

Norah checking her out :)

Giving Grace the gifts Kyler and Norah picked out

Wide awake!

Talking to Grandma Deb

All loaded up!

Ready to head home!

Grace's Birth Story

I have to start out by saying that I kind of have to laugh at the timing of Grace's arrival.  Kyler was born one day early and Norah was born on her due date, so I was kind of assuming she would just follow suit, right? :)  The other thing I have to laugh at is the night before her arrival, it was a Wednesday night, and we had gone to church for dinner.  Several people had asked how I was doing, feeling, etc., and I kept saying the same thing, "not too bad, a bit uncomfortable, but I just hope she waits until after Saturday to arrive because my mom is out of town at a conference for the next two days".  Little did I know that she would be here in the next 24 hours! :)  Anyways, I went to bed Wednesday night, and woke up about 1:00 am on Thursday.  I had been waking up in the middle of the night for some time now, so I didn't really think anything of it, rolled over to try to get comfortable and go back to sleep.  However, I couldn't quite get back to sleep and a little before 2:00, I thought that my water might have broke.  I wasn't sure, so after waiting for a bit, I decided to get up and use the restroom.  After trying to decide if my water was really broke or not, I started to get nervous, so I woke up Erik.  By this time it was after 2:00 am.  He suggested I call labor and delivery, and I said that I knew they would tell me to come in.  After some debate, I called about 2:30, and they said, "how soon can you get here" and I said, "as soon as we can get someone to watch our kids!".  So, Erik called his parents, and his dad answered.  Erik told him we needed to go to the hospital, and his dad replied with, "good luck", and Erik said, "no, we need someone to come over here and stay with Kyler and Norah".  So, as soon as Craig arrived, we were out the door.  My last words were, "hopefully, we'll be back!" :)  Anyways, we arrived at the hospital a little after 3:00 and went to triage.  I had to lay down for a bit because if I was ruptured, the aminiotic fluid would pool and they would be able to tell.  The nurse, who also helped deliver Norah, came back and took one look and said, "yep, you're definately ruptured, today is baby day!".  I was still slightly confused, because this was totally opposite my labor with Kyler and Norah.  With both of them, I had contractions for a long time before I went to the hospital and then they broke my water the rest of the way at the hospital when I was towards the end of labor.  I was also confused because I didn't think I was having any contractions.  However, while lying there, hooked up to the monitors, the nurse said, "did you feel that?" and I was like, "yeah, a little bit" (it just felt like some pressure), she goes, "you just had a contraction".  Also to keep in mind, at my appoitment on Tuesday (two days prior), I was only dialated to about 1 cm, and when the nurse checked me at the hospital when we got there, I was still only at about 1 cm.  So, she suggested we start walking the halls to get things going.  I was slightly nervous when I heard this as all I could think about was how long this was going to take, and I wanted to try to have a natural birth again, and didn't want any petosin, which I thought I might have to have if things didn't start to get going.  So, about 4:00 am, Erik and I started walking the halls and making loops around labor and delivery. :)  They got us checked in, and in a room, and a while later Erik went and got our stuff from the van, since we would obviously be staying. :)  It took a while, but soon I was having some noticable contractions.  We walked and walked, people kept joking we were going to wear down the carpet with how many loops we took.  We also sat in our room for a bit and rested since we had both gotten about 2 and 3 hours of sleep.  About noon, I asked to be checked again, but I was only at about 3 cm.  I was a bit disappointed as contractions were starting to get uncomfortable, and I didn't know how long it would take to get fully dialated.  However, after noon things started to really pick up.  The doctors "switched" at noon, so shortly after, the doctor on call came in and talked to me to see how things were going.  The doctor and the nurses kept asking if I wanted to get in the bath or do something else, as I was definatley uncomfortable by now.  In my head the bath sounded nice, but I was so afraid that if I got in, I wouldn't be able to get back out. :)  I think they then checked me around 2:30 or 3:00 and I was maybe at 8 cm.  A little after 3:00, they convinced me to get in the bath.  I was in the bath for about 5 min, and had about 2 hard contractions and then I had to push.  So, the nurses and Erik got me out of the bath and back in bed.  Everyone came rushing in to get ready for delivery.  I remember pushing for about 10 to 15 min or so, and then at 4:04 Miss Grace arrived!  There were times when I really questioned whether or not I could do it naturally again, but I knew that once she was here, it would be all over, and we made it!  

She's Here!!

Grace Esther joined our family at 4:04 pm on October 17th!!  She weighed 6 lbs 6.8 oz and was 19.25 inches long.  We think she looks just like Kyler. :)

All clean!

Hello world :)

Getting weighed

Snuggling with mom :)

Meeting Kyler and Norah

Big Sister :)

Big Brother :)

Aunt Leah!

Family of 5 :)

First bath at the hospital

All snuggled in :)

Grace's birth story to follow :)