Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving in Kansas this year with Seth's family. We have so much to be thankful for and it was good to be reminded of all of the blessings in our lives. The cousins had a great time together. I got to take my nieces Black Friday shopping. I can't believe they're already at the age that gets excited about shopping! I had so much fun with them and got some great deals too.

All of Rachelle's family joined us as well, it was a lot of fun! Here's a shot of the table during our Thanksgiving feast. My was it a feast!

Landon was so excited about his special blueberry pie. He was telling everyone about how he was going to have blueberry pie on Thanksgiving. This started by reading the Olivia the pig Christmas book that had blueberry pie in it and he asked me in a sincere voice, "mommy, is blueberry pie good??" I told him it was, and since I have him on a gluten free diet right now, I asked him if he would like me to make him a special one for Thanksgiving. Of course he did, and apparently it was pretty good, thankfully he's not very picky ;)

 Camryn holding James for the first time

Landon and Miles holding James - sweet boys!

Iowa trip

The kids and I took a trip to spend some time with my family. Landon actually got to go a week early and spend time with my parents. This smile shows how much fun he had! 

Landon and Olivia got to spend time with my childhood friend's kids which was fun to see :)

All the cousins got together and made Christmas cookies, they all had such a good time :)

...and we got to celebrate my niece, Gwenyth's 1st birthday! 

She is such a doll and was so excited about her party!

I also got to spend some time with some awesome friends. Ten years ago we all spent our freshman year together at Emmaus. We had a great time catching up and picked up right where we left off...

It was so nice not to feel rushed, but to have plenty of time to spend with everybody. I was so thankful for a relaxing week with my family and friends. I was planning on driving back home by myself, but mom insisted she help me do the long drive. We didn't know how she would get back, but she said she was trusting the Lord to get her back. The very next morning, back home, I went to BSF and ran into a friend who was headed north and was willing to take my mom along. So thankful for the Lord's faithfulness!

James is 2 months old

Our sweet little James is already 2 months old, and he's changing everyday! I'm not sure how much he weighs or how long he is, but he's definitely a lot bigger than he was last month. I went to pick him up in his bassinet tonight and he had rolled over! I can't leave him on a bed anymore to nap because he wiggles his way around so well. 

He's smiling a lot now and is starting to squeal and coo a little bit. I just love seeing his sweet personality start to shine through. He sleeps pretty well, still wakes up once or twice, but he goes right back to sleep so it's really not bad. He loves to snuggle, which I love and wish I could sit and do more of with him, but I treasure the moments that I can. He's so alert and bright eyed and just seems to be taking everything in.

                             

Landon and Olivia just love their baby brother. He's going to have no concept of personal space! He seems to really love them as well :)

Love how Landon always asks to snuggle with James.

Landon and James doing their grumpy faces

1 month old

Our sweet James is already 1 month old. Right now he is 9lb 8oz and 22.1 inches long. It's hard to believe that he is pretty much the size that Landon was when he was first born! He's starting to outgrow his newborn clothes, which is sad, but he is smiling more! It's so fun to start to see his little personality shining through. He's sleeping pretty well at night, usually only waking up once to eat and goes right back to sleep. I just need to start going to bed earlier to get the sleep that I need!

Olivia is getting better with sharing her mama. It was rough at first... Any time I would leave the house, she would throw a big fit, at bedtime she would ask for me to stay with her, and one time a 10 month old wanted me to hold him and she ran up to me pulled my arms around her and said, "That's my mommy!" During this time she said things like, "I pull baby's head off?" "I squish the baby?" and other mean things... Needless to say, I bring the bouncy seat into the bathroom and lock the door when I shower! Little by little though, she is coming around. She loves him, and smothers him with kisses and hugs whenever he is in her reach. She's always asking me, when he's down for a nap, "Where's Jamesy boy?" Landon is a good big brother to him as well and loves to hold him and give him kisses.

That's where he's at, can't believe a month has passed since he's joined our family, but we're enjoying every minute with him!

Samuel's 6th Birthday

We had a nice weekend remembering our sweet Samuel. Landon and I made cupcakes on Saturday. Landon picked out confetti cake mix and frosting with sprinkles. He loved helping make these and "helping" me by licking the beater clean :)

My sweet friend gave me a gift at church that morning and Landon asked if we could open it. I told him we would wait until we went to visit Samuel. Then, Landon said, "Are we going to heaven??" I said, "No, we're just going to where Samuel's body is buried." These things are so hard for a four year old to understand. It was heartbreaking to see how excited he was to meet his brother. One day...

When we opened the present, this is what we found... Little figurines of our whole family! It is so sweet to see what our family really looks like. From the left: Olivia wearing a tutu (she was thrilled with this!), Samuel holding 6 balloons, Daddy, Mommy wearing my Samuel necklace, Landon because blue's his favorite color, and James because the James on Thomas is red ;) Landon and Olivia kept insisting that James lay down since he can't walk yet :)

Then, we went to Steak N' Shake, our family tradition.  It was a sweet time.

After supper, we came home and sang happy birthday to Samuel and had cupcakes.

There's a helium shortage, so we weren't able to let balloons off on Samuel's birthday, but we did the next day. It was so windy....

 ...and I'm sad to say that the balloons got stuck in our neighbor's tree. This really upset me at first and I couldn't pin point why. I guess I just wanted everything to go perfectly for his birthday. When I thought about this later, I realized that life doesn't go perfectly with our other kiddos, and he is just as much our kid as they are, it's not practical to expect things to be perfect and that's ok.

The pregnancy loss support group I help out with had a balloon release the night after his birthday as well, so I got to send a balloon up then too.

We miss our sweet firstborn so much and celebrate his being in heaven the only way we know how. Can't wait to join him one day on those streets of gold, but until that day, His mercies are new every morning - great is His faithfulness.

Six Years

It's hard to believe that Samuel would be six tomorrow... I was laying here trying to picture what he would be like, how our family dynamic would be different if he were here. Would he have a strong personality like Landon, or would he have been more calm and have been taught Landon how to share and be kind? How would Landon, Olivia, and James be different if he were here? Would he have been into sports or legos? What it all boils down to is, I just want to know him. As his mother, I want to know everything about him. And yet, it is all just blank. I try to picture him as a six year old... I so want to know if he would have had brown hair and brown eyes like his daddy or would he have had blue eyes like his siblings and I? So many things... but it is all blank.

I realize he wasn't meant to be six here on earth. The Lord knew when he would be born, and knew he would leave this earth just one minute later. The Lord fashioned him and perfectly formed his beautiful face, each finger and toe. It is not blank to Him. He had a purpose for our little guy. Our little Samuel was created to worship the Lord.

I cannot help but cry every time I read the story of Hannah in the Bible. How she wanted a child, so much that if the Lord granted her request, she was willing to give him back to the Lord. It's one thing to say that you would give your child to the Lord and another thing to do it. Hannah did not go back on her word, but as hard as it was, she made the journey to the temple and gave her Samuel to serve the Lord. "'I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him. So now I give him to the LORD. For his whole life he will be given over to the Lord.' And he worshiped the Lord there." (1 Samuel 1:27,28)

I remember the Lord reminding me of Hannah as I lay in the hospital bed the night before my c-section. I knew that our baby boy belonged to the Lord and whatever happened he was not mine, he was the Lord's. I remember wrestling in prayer with the Lord, begging Him to let our boy live. I remember my loving Lord giving me peace that He was in control and I committed our sweet Samuel to Him.

How tiny, how precious our boy's delicate body. It was so precious to feel his heartbeat, and yet heart wrenching since no breath ever came. Still the Lord was in control.

I was thankful for a sweet friend who shared this poem from a blog recently. The challenge that went with it was to change our prayers for our children. Not to pray for safety and protection, but that our children would have a passion for the Lord. Period. No matter what path gets them there. I would not have chosen this path, but I am thankful for how the Lord has used our sweet Samuel's life in so many ways and that right at this very minute he is with our Lord and worshiping Him there.

Had I been Joseph's mother 
I'd have prayed 
protection from his brothers 
"God, keep him safe. 
He is so young, 
so different from 
the others." 
Mercifully, 
she never knew 
there would be slavery 
and prison, too. 

Had I been Moses' mother 
I'd have wept to keep my little son: 
praying she might forget 
the babe drawn from the water 
of the Nile. 
Had I not kept 
him for her 
nursing him the while, 
was he not mine? 
--and she 
but Pharaoh's daughter? 

Had I been Daniel's mother 
I should have pled 
"Give victory! 
--this Babylonian horde 
godless and cruel-- 
Don't let him be a captive 
--better dead, 
Almighty Lord!" 

Had I been Mary, 
Oh, had I been she, 
I would have cried 
as never a mother cried, 
"Anything, O God, 
Anything 
--but 
crucified." 

With such prayers importunate 
my finite wisdom would assail 
Infinite Wisdom 
God, how fortunate 
Infinite Wisdom 
should prevail.

From newborn to baby...

I knew this would happen, but had forgotten just how quickly it would... that one day this little one would go to bed a newborn and wake up a baby. Well, that happened yesterday. I looked at him and realized that he's much more alert, his wrinkly skin is smoothing out, and he was even concentrating and attempted a couple smiles! Every stage is so sweet and flies by, now more than ever with my attention being divided three ways. Here's a movie of him sleeping at two weeks old... yes, I he really is sleeping despite his eyes being opened!

Last night, James went to his first TU game!

And here he is today at three weeks old, his face is always so grumpy!

Here he is with his crazy big sister who always wants to be around him

...and with big brother who loves him so much

He still looks a little bit like a newborn when he's sleeping, but the newborn look is very quickly fading...

I am so thankful for the past three weeks with this sweet boy.

The weeks, months and years seem to be flying by faster as life moves forward and I am reminded of the brevity of life and have been asking the Lord to help me to redeem the time. 

Here are ways the Bible describes our life: 

Like water spilt on the ground

Like a shadow, it will not stay 

Like a swift messenger, a swift ship, or a swooping eagle

Like a mist or vapor from a pot

 Like grass, leaving no memory 

Few days, like a flower 

Like a wind

Like a sigh

Psalm 90:12

"So teach us to number our days, That we may gain a heart of wisdom."

James David

We are so thankful for our precious new bundle of joy! I thought I'd a little bit about how he made his appearance into this world. 

I had been having some harder contractions that started Sunday evening. There was never anything regular with them, but I knew they were the kind of contractions that were doing something! I was scheduled to be induced at 6:00AM on Wednesday morning September 19th so this gave me hope that maybe I would go on my own before the induction. My parents came down Tuesday evening around 8:00pm. I was so thankful and relieved to have them here.

 We all went to bed around 11:00, but I started to notice that these hard contractions that I had been having were getting a bit more intense. Around midnight I started timing them. They were about 10 minutes apart, so I figured I would try to get some sleep... Well, these contractions did not allow for that! I woke Seth up around 1:00 and told him even though the contractions were still about 7 minutes apart I really thought we needed to start getting ready to go to the hospital. By the time we left the house they were 3-5 minutes apart. At this point I decided I wanted an epidural... NOW! :)

We got to the hospital around 2:00AM. They checked me and I was already 6cm dilated. The worst part was trying to sign paper work and get the IVs in between contractions. At this point it was just one contraction after another. I was begging for an epidural and they just seemed to be taking their sweet time (I see now that I was a bit irrational then...). She told me that I had to have a whole bag of the IV solution in me before they could give me an epidural. Well, the bag of fluid was full so I said, "there's no way that bag of fluid is getting into me before this baby is born!" I was so glad when she decided they could go ahead and do one after all.

At 3:30 I got my epidural and my doctor came to check me. She said I was complete and ready to push! The epidural had slowed down my contractions though, so they had to give me a little pitocin to get things going again. 

At 4:03AM  our little James David was born. It was so exciting to hear our doctor say, "it's a boy!" We were so surprised! He was 8lb 3oz and 21.25" long. I love his wrinkly skin and old man face :) He always looks so grumpy!

Our first look at the little guy. We feel so blessed and so grateful that everything went so well and he is finally in our arms!

Our new family! Landon was very excited it was a boy and I think Olivia is too. She is having a bit of a tough time adjusting to sharing her mommy, but all in all she is doing pretty well. Landon can't wait to teach James all the things that big brothers do :)

Summer

This summer has flown by and I can't believe we will be meeting our sweet little baby in just a few days! I have totally neglected this blog, but I hope that will change... Let's see, my last post was April. I'll try to recap our summer:

May - Landon turned 4 and had his first friends birthday party. The kids had fun playing games with water balloons :) It was already getting very hot!

June - Getting hotter... We stayed inside a lot, or played at the mall. Landon took swimming lessons and finally got comfortable in the water! This was a huge accomplishment for him. His teachers were great. I never would have thought of telling him to hum when he goes under water, but that really helped him not to get water in his nose and take away his fear of going under!

A sad thing for us that happened was Seth's sweet aunt, Donna, passed away. I really enjoyed getting to know her these past several months, she was an incredible woman who truly loved the Lord and trusted Him until the very end. I am thankful for her sake, she isn't suffering anymore, but miss her dearly.

July - Hotter still... We made it up to Iowa for the annual 4th of July conference. It was so refreshing to spend time with family and friends and being reminded of the Lord's love and faithfulness. We had a new niece born, Evy, and got to meet her on our way home. She was so tiny and precious!

August - I didn't think it could happen, but yes even hotter... Went to Lake of the Ozarks with my family. We celebrated Olivia and her cousin, Aubrey's 2nd birthdays. They were very excited about their pink watermelon cake :)  It was such a sweet time. We enjoyed watching the olympics, boating, swimming, late night talks, so much fun! I couldn't believe how Landon was in the water. He was doing flips off the side of the boat! Such a change from last summer. We had a break-in, but I am thankful that the kids and I weren't here and it truly has been a good reminder not to hold things here dear. We can take nothing from this world with us - only what's done for Christ will last.

September - Still hot... Labor Day weekend, most of Seth's family came into town and we had a work weekend at his parents house.... well, the guys worked while the kids played and the ladies talked - it was great! I feel so blessed to be a part of such a wonderful family. My labor day didn't come unfortunately ;) but we are patiently waiting this little one's arrival. We can't wait to find out if this baby is a he or a she. I already know he/she is a night owl (must take after daddy). Every night my favorite activity is to watch my belly jump around :) An induction is scheduled for Wednesday at 6:00AM, but I'm praying that I will go into labor on my own. Anyway, can't wait to post next time as it will probably be about our newest addition!

Spring

I can't believe my last post was about Christmas and here we are four months later! A lot has happened. I'm almost 20 weeks pregnant with our fourth little one. It's been so fun to recently be able to consistently feel this sweet one move. Seth just started feeling the baby kick too! It's such a comfort and I treasure each kick. I pray the Lord will continue to bless this pregnancy and we will be able to meet this precious baby mid-September. This time we won't know whether this little one is a boy or a girl until that time, we're excited to have the surprise!

Life has been crazy, but I feel like I've started to be able to get back into somewhat of a routine after feeling sick and tired a lot of my first trimester. Landon and Olivia are growing so fast, I sometimes wish I could just pause time and enjoy them longer at each stage, but time just keeps going. Landon will be four in ten days. I can hardly believe it! He is becoming more and more independent, and being able to help around the house. He just learned how to swing all by himself and is out on the swing almost every chance he can get. Olivia wants to do everything Landon is doing. She loves to read books, especially Good Night Moon, "Goodbye Moon" as she calls it :)

We have been enjoying spending time with Seth's aunt Donna. She was diagnosed with ALS last summer and came to live with his parents here in Tulsa back in November. She has such a joyful spirit through this all and we love her so much. Pray for her if you think of it. She is now bed-ridden but is able to communicate via iPad, but it is getting more difficult for her.

We had an eventful month of March as we had termites, rotted wood under the toilet, reconstruction in the bathroom (that we are still doing... cant't wait to get our toilet back in there!) and two sets of visitors. I'm so glad our visitors weren't deterred by our construction mess - we had so much fun! First, my sister, two good friends, my sweet niece and my friend's two boys came to visit. They did so much work while they were here, it was so sweet of them! We redid my fireplace which totally makes my living room look like a new place! They also helped paint our bathroom which was also in desperate need of attention. I so appreciate such good family and friends and it was so sweet to spend time with them as I don't see them often enough.

Our next set of visitors was my brother, Alan, sister-in-law Lauren, and darling nieces Nora, Gillian, and Aubrey. The kids had a blast playing with each other and we even got to celebrate Nora's 6th birthday together. I so appreciated Lauren's help with picking out tile and ideas for decorating. We had such a great time together and sweet memories were made.

We had a nice Easter this year. The kids had a blast Easter egg hunting. They also loved learning about the resurrection story using the Resurrection Eggs.

Enjoying this spring and looking forward to this summer :)

Christmas Recap

We had a great christmas with both families. This was the first year we stayed in Tulsa since we've been married. Seth's aunt Donna is staying with Seth's parents right now. Unfortunately, Donna and Seth's mom were both sick on Christmas Eve, so we stopped in for a short visit, but let them rest up. We had a great Christmas Eve with Justin and April and the kids. We made chocolate dipped marshmallows with the kids. Then the kids watched "Elf" and the adults played Spades. We hadn't played cards in so long, it was so much fun to play and laugh.


Christmas morning was so much fun. We had to wake the kids up since it was Sunday and we wanted to open presents before going to church. Landon was so excited to open his stocking and presents. It was so much fun to see his joy :) Olivia had fun opening the presents, but didn't really get what was going on. Her favorite presents were her Tea Pot, dolly, musical book and bear. Landon's favorite gifts were his stand up sand box, shark car toy, lego Thomas and all the little legos :) I got a coupon from Build-A-Bear for a free bear and Seth and I decided to go as a family to pick out a bear "from Samuel" for the kids. I think this is going to be our new Christmas tradition. Landon named the bear, "Cucumber" :)


We had cinnamon rolls and just overall had a nice morning together. After church, we went over to Seth's parents since they were feeling a little better. We watched the Thunder game and had a yummy dinner together. It was very relaxing and just nice to be together.

The next weekend, all of Seth's family came into town. We had so much fun laughing and spending time together. Seth's parents went crazy for Christmas, and I got a guitar! I'm super excited about learning to play. The kids love to come and help me strum while I learn. We had some nice big boxes from all the loot so the kids decorated them and had a great time playing house in them.






We also celebrated Camryn's 8th birthday with a pinata and a cake that she decorated with melted chocolate and Andes mint chips. It was such a sweet time.


This last weekend, we made it up to Iowa for our last celebrations. We traveled through the night getting in at 4am on Friday. This worked out really well with the kids. Landon slept from 9pm-8am and Olivia was up for a couple hours on the trip and woke up again when we got there, but overall did great. On Saturday we had almost the entire family together, minus two husbands. We ordered pizza and just had a nice day together. We watched some old home movies which had us all laughing and some blushing :) We had such a wonderful childhood, it was so fun to look back and remember.


I loved holding my precious two month old niece. She was really smiling and almost laughing, it was hard to leave her!


Sad to see things come to an end, but sweet memories were made. It's a new year now and I'm excited to see what the Lord has for us this 2012.