Amy's Finished Room

What timing!!! I had finally found some time to sit down and paint the letters for Amy's room and as soon as I was done, I went to take some trash out and noticed a package on the doorstep. The package was from my mom and it contained the wall hangings that she has been working on for Amy's room. She bought fabric that matched Amy's bedding when she was with us and then took pictures of Amy's room before she left. The wall hangings turned out beautiful and go so well with the room. I had some leftover ribbon when I made the bows for the letters so I tied them on the crib mobile to add a little more color to it. The only other thing that I may do is buy some peachy-pink or aqua pannel to add to the white pannel on the window. I just haven't found one that is the right color yet.

6 Months

Amy is only a few days from being 6 months old. I took some pictures of her recently when she was all dressed up for church. Yeah, I actually had spare time for once, amazing!!! Normally we are so rushed on Sunday mornings.
She is such a cutie pie!!!!!

Tiger Scout

Charles is in first grade this year and is old enough to join Cub Scouts. He was so excited and really enjoys his special time with Dad on Monday evenings. Once a month his pack goes on a field trip. His first field trip was to the local library where they went on a scavenger hunt, were given a guided tour of the library, and got library cards (if they didn't already have one). Then they each got to check out two books. Charles already had a library card so he was able to go straight to the shelves and pick out some books.
I had my first sewing experience in a long long time, trying to sew the patches on to Charles' uniform. Whew, I still have his Den patch to sew on, but at least the others are sewn and in the right spot.
These are the smallest pants that they had at the store. They are a size 4. They have pants legs that zip on to make them pants. Yes, he is actually wearing the shorts version! Not only that but I have the elastic in the wastband pulled to the tightest setting so that the pants stay on. I think they were a little off on the sizing, as Charles normally wears a size 6. Oh well, at least I don't have to worry about him outgrowing his uniform anytime soon. I purposely got the Medium shirt instead of Small, as he'll need to use this shirt for three years, and I don't want to have to transfer patches from one shirt to the other.
I finally took pictures of Charles in his outfit. He makes the goofiest smiles!!!!

First School Project

Charles had his first take home project. The first of many I'm sure!!!! Actually this post is so late that he has his second take home project on the kitchen counter that we will work on this weekend. He was learning about living and nonliving things and his project was to create a pet rock and decorate it however he wanted, with assistance from his parents, and then he had to fill out an information sheet about his pet rock. He had to give the pet rock a name, draw a picture of his pet rock and list the things that he used to make the pet rock. We let Charles do whatever he wanted and only gave him some direction with the materials. He chose to make an elephant. The hardest part of this project was, believe it or not, finding a rock!!! We live in Florida, and there was plenty of sand and concrete in our yard, but NO rocks. And I didn't think that a chip of concrete would qualify. We even walked around the neighborhood to see if there were rocks by some of the retaining ponds or park. He ended up ringing the doorbell of one of our neighbors who bought and used rocks for their garden instead of mulch. He asked permission to take one of their rocks for a school project. It was so cute, the lady was a little confused at first, but then agreed. Later, when Charles finished the project, he went back to the neighbors and showed them his pet rock. I took this picture several weeks after the pet rock was created and I wish that I had taken the picture sooner, as the poor elephant looks a little rough. Oh well.

4 months already

Yes, our little girl is already 4 months old! Actually, by now she's technically 4 and a half months. But this picture was taken when she was 4 months. She's growing and has moved up to a larger diaper size. She's definitely getting more weight in her thighs and I can already see that if she keeps growing, we're going to have an issue fitting her into non streatchy type pants in the fall/winter. So far shorts and skirts seem to work just fine. She is reaching for toys and babbling and smiling. She hold her head up very well and will tolerate about 15mins of tummy time before she starts to get upset. I've put her in a bouncy/excersaucer and she likes that for a few minutes but is still a little small to completely appreciate all of the cool features. I can definitely see her go to town in that thing in another month or two though. Amy is still a very very happy and easy baby. She is such a blessing to all of us!
Her doctors appointment went very well. She was 14lbs 12oz and 26 inches long. She was in the 90th percentile in both height and weight. She's still 100% on breastmilk and I guess that's working well. I'm able to keep up with her demand, in fact lately she hasn't been eating as well as I think she has a cold or her gums are bothering her. I don't plan to start her on cereal for at least another month. Well I think that's about it. Here is a new picture of her. Love her blue eyes!!!

Lunch with Big Brother

Charles started school on August 5th. He is now officially a First Grader! Amy happened to have her 4month well baby drs appointment so I had to take off of work one morning and I decided to also keep Ryan home from dacyare and we were able to meet Charles for lunch at school that day. It was a mini family reunion in the lunch room. We couldn't eat outside on the picnic tables because it was too hot. But they gave us a whole table to ourself. Mostly I think because we were taking up too much room and disrupting the assigned seating for the classes. Lol! Anyways, we had a good time.

Little Thumb Sucker

Yes, neither of the boys really sucked their thumbs when they were a baby. Charles didn't start until he was 4, and so far Ryan hasn't started. Anyways, Amy clearly sucks her thumb, and not by accident. I've caught her numerous times with her thumb in the mouth. It's just easier for her to find her own thumb than track down a pacifier that she's accidentally spit out. She doesn't have the coordination for that yet. She looks so peacful sucking her thumb, and it saves mommy from having to wake up in the middle of the night and give her a pacifier to calm her back down. Amy calms herself down on her own - usually.

Our Little Giraffe

When Laura was here visiting she brought a few gifts for the little ones. These are some pjs that she got for Amy. Amy looked so adorable in them I just had to take some pictures! Here she is in her crib just smiling up at me after having taken a bath.

4th of July

Boy this post is old, but I realize that I haven't updated the blog in over a month. Whew, I knew this would happen when I started going back to work full time. Fortunately I'm still remembering to take pictures, so when I do have the time, I can go back and fill you in on everything that as happened (or the fun/important stuff).
Here are some pictures taken of our Church's 4th of July Celebration. I got to paint faces and had an absolute blast. Here are some pictures of what I did for Caitlyn and Charles. Charles requested a dolphin stencil. Caitlyn's was completely drawn from scratch.

Smiling

Amy is almost three months old and she is smiling and reaching for her toys and constantly kicking. You can't lay her down or sit her up without her kicking her legs back and forth, back and forth. It's a little hard to capture Amy's smiles on camera so I tried with the video. She is such a cutie right now. It's going to be awfully hard for me to drop her off at daycare in five days (not that I'm counting :-)

Sleeping Update

Well, you may not be overly excited about this post, but I sure am!!! Amy has been sleeping in her crib for about a month now and does pretty well on most nights.
Yesterday Amy officially slept through the night! Yes, if she woke up, I didn't hear her and the monitor is right next to my ear. She ate at 8PM, was burped etc. but I held her for the next two hours as we were watching a show on tv. Then I put her in her crib at 10pm (she woke up slightly as I put her in her crib, but didn't fuss, just needed her pacifier and closed her eyes and went to sleep). The next time I heard her make a peep, and it wasn't much of a fuss, just a few grunting sounds, was 5:48am. Yep! No middle of the night feeding! If Amy keeps this up, we'll be in great shape when I go back to work a week from now. In fact, if she keeps up with this schedule, I may have to wake her up to have enough time to feed her in the mornings!

2 Months

Amy turned two months old on Monday! She saw the doctor yesterday and is a healthy little girl. She weighs 12lbs 11oz and is 24inches long.
I think she was 90th percentile in length and 75th percentile in weight. The boys were with me when I took her there and we had a funny moment when the doctor was checking to see if Amy was healthy before the nurse gave her the shots and Amy started fussing a little, followed immediately by a concerned older brother Ryan who stood up from his chair and told the doctor "you have to be gentle with my baby!". Lol! The doctor got a kick out of that. And then the boys carried on a rather lengthy conversation with the nurse asking her why she gave the shots to Amy and not the doctor. Her response was because the doctor doesn't like being the bad guy. So the boys replied, so you like being the bad guy! Lol!

Amy got very upset whe she was given the shots, but was completely asleep before I was finished dressing her and stayed that way for the next 5 hours!

I had fed her in between when the doctor saw her and the nurse came in with the shots, so I guess her stomach was full and she was exhausted. Last night was not the best night she has had, she was up quite a few times and was restless for a good part of the night. Poor thing her legs are bothering her and she feels just a tad warm. I'm hoping things will be better today.

Family Photo Shoot

Here are some group shots of our recent attempt to get a new family photo. Boy is it a LOT harder to get everything right with a group of six! Had to get everyone to look in the same direction, smile but not too much (boys tend to over-smile which ends up in a huge grin but closed eyes) keep Caitlyn's hair out of her eyes, keep Amy awake but not fussing, and her dress down (covering her diaper). We weren't sucessful in everything, but oh well... :-)

Amy's Baby Announcement

I worked and worked on Amy's baby announcement. I took the pictures myself when she was sleeping and created the file from scratch with photoshop. I think I'm almost there. I'm getting some last minute expert advice from Leslie and Laura and should have something to take to the photo lab next week. Here's what it looks like now. You may need to click on the photo to get a better view.

Here is the version after the graphic artist in the family (Aunt Laura) worked on it, and what will be going to the printers. Fancy huh?

Evening Swim

Last week we promised the boys to take them to the pool one evening. By the time we got there it was already after 7PM, but we did get in about 30mins of fun before it was time to head home and go to bed. Amy was syling in her new bathing suit and cover up from Aunt Laura. She actually went in the water, or got half of her body wet, the water was not very cold, still cool but not too far from body temperature.

The boys had a blast of course. They always do. Spent the whole time chasing the football going from one side of the pool to the next.

I had to snap a picture of Ryan's outfit! He has a proper bathingsuit underneath, but you can't tell. Anyways, he reminded me of the Michelin tire guy, only in blue! :-) Lol! Maybe it's time to get these boys some swimming lessons, huh? :-)

Amy's First Month

Here is an album of a few pictures taken during Amy's first month.

Amy's Room

This is still a work in progress but I'm not sure when I'll get around to putting the finishing touches on the walls. Here is what Amy's room looks like now. I have everything set up and in place and the walls painted, I just don't have any decorations on the walls. Mommy has some fabric and it going to make a few things and I have some letters, shelves and stencils that I plan to put on the walls. The green is rather bright, and not a typical color for a baby girl's room, but the bedding is primarily cream colored and the furniture a cherry red color, so we decided that the green accent color was the best to use as it really shows off the bedding and brings out the red in the furniture.

Soccer Game

Charles is in a YMCA Soccer League for 5-6yr olds. Seth volunteered to be an assistant coach along with another dad. The team's coach is on staff at the YMCA as well as coaches another team of older kids and appears to have a few conflicts with some of the practices and games. Plus with the attention-span of a group of 10 5-6yr olds, she needs all the help she can get! :-) The three-coached team appears to be off to a great start. Charles' team, the "Green Dragons", won their first game 4-1. Charles played a majority of this game on defense and did a GREAT job. He stayed in his spot and didn't hesitate to go up to the opponents and kick the ball. I think he kicked the ball away at least six different times! Once Charles kicked the ball so far that it went past all of the players into the opposite side of the field and allowed one of his teammates to get the ball and score a goal! Charles' first game was by far more exciting and more organized than we thought it would be. Definitely looking forward to the next 5 games this season and hopefully many more years of soccer to come!

Three Weeks Old

Well, Amy turned three weeks yesterday. How time flies! Her umbilical cord stump fell off on Sunday morning and Amy has already had two baths. The first one was a little rushed as she was hungry and screaming most of the time, but the second time went much better as she had just been fed and only cried at the very end when her hair was being washed. I weighed her after her bath and she is 10lbs 8oz. So she has gained almost exactly 2lbs in three weeks. I'll have to figure out if that is normal or not, I think I read somewhere that babies gain 2/3rds of a pound per week for the first few weeks and then it goes down to 1/2lb per week for a while. If that is true, then I guess Amy is right on target. She still fits into some newborn items but they no longer have much growing room left and will soon be packed up, sniff sniff.

Amy also had her first bottle yesterday. She was sleeping when it was time to feed her and I had a small amount of expressed breastmilk in the fridge that I needed to use up, so I just pumped and made a bottle for her. She then woke up and my mom got to feed her the bottle while I put Charles and Ryan to bed. She did very well but even though the nipple was marked slow flow, she drank it in record time, something like six minutes! Oh well, I guess I no longer have to worry about her adjusting to a bottle - if it has milk in it, she'll drink it!!! :-)

Relaxing

Well, so far, Amy loves to eat, burp, sleep and dirty diapers. Yep, nothing really exciting to report yet. In fact today, I think she sleept almost the entire day. I often had to wake her up for her feedings and even then, she ate with her eyes closed. About the only time you'll hear her cry is when you change her diaper or outfit. She doesn't like being cold or woken up!

The pediatrician couldn't fit in a visit today, so we have an appoitment for tomorrow instead, and were able to stay at home today. We did fit in a walk around the neighborhood to give mom some excercise and Amy some fresh air and indirect sunlight. We tried out her new stroller and she loved it. She also loves her new bouncy seat that vibrates. Thank you Aunt Leslie and Uncle Nick. With the vibrate on or off, she loves being bundled up and strapped in to the bouncy seat.

Here are some pictures taken today (5 days old), enjoy!

Welcome Amy Claire Smith

We went to the hospital at 10AM on Wednesday morning for a scheduled c-section at noon. Everything went as planned, the doctor was held up at her office and running a little late so the c-section was started around 1PM instead of noon, but the extra wait wasn't that bad. Seth was with Cara while grandparents and big brothers waited out in the lobby. At exactly 1:18PM, the doctor announced "it's a girl!" and we were both so surprised and extreemly happy that we had tears in our eyes. It was most definitely a special moment that we will remember forever.

Amy Claire Smith was born on Wednesday, April 7th, at 1:18PM. She weighed a healthy 8lbs 9oz, was 20 inches long. Cara and Amy are both doing very very well. Amy seems to be doing much better with the jaundice than either Charles or Ryan and we may not have to make all of the trips back and forth to the lab for bloodwork and visits with the pediatrician for the first week or two, as we had to for Charles and Ryan. Amy is eating very well and sleeping most of the time. In fact, so far, she appears to be a very calm baby!!! Her older brothers ask about her all the time, especially if they can't see her or don't know where she is. Charles just loves staring at Amy and often says that she is so beautiful! And Ryan likes to touch her (feet, nose, ears, everything!!!), in fact, he'll stop what he's doing and just out of the blue, go over and "have to touch Amy". :-)

Okay, that's it for now, but let's just say that the camera is working overtime and I'll be posting more pictures soon.

Almost There

Well, I keep thinking that I have to upload new pictures in order to post a new blog entry, but that process is not so easy and I keep putting it off! There are quite a few new exciting things going on, that I'll just have to post pictures later.

First, we are officially three weeks away (or less) from welcoming a new member to our family. We're all so excited about the baby and can't wait to meet him or her. We finally came up with a girl and a boy name that we like as well as middle names, so this baby can officially arrive any day now and we won't be paniking, or at least not about names. I still have some organizing and cleaning projects that I want to complete - so I need at least another weekend and two would be better. So far I'm still doing well (noticing some swelling in the ankles especially at night, but my hands and face don't feel or look that swollen, so I think I'm okay). And the baby is still VERY active - I don't think he/she sleeps any longer than 20mins at a time! My doctor hasn't even put me on weekly visits yet and I'm only three weeks away from having this baby (we're scheduled to go to the hospital on April 7th). I guess she doesn't seem to be worried about our health or that I'll go into labor early.

Next is the exciting news that Ryan is officially a big boy now! Yes, he is fully potty trained and we're all LOVING it!!!! Boy he took his time getting to this stage, but something clicked and he pretty much decided on his own that it was VERY COOL to use the potty and not have accidents anymore AND absolutely loves his new big boy underwear. He even picks out his underwear days ahead of time and plans which one he's going to wear next. With Charles we had quite a few accidents in big boy underwear so I'm a little shocked that Ryan is doing so well. We don't have to ask him if he needs to go, he goes on his own, or if we're on the road or running errands he'll let us know he needs to go. He is really taking this big boy thing seriously and honestly does not need any of our help. He even unzips, zips AND snaps his own pants, and recently has sown me that he can put on his shoes all by himself. He only occasionally needs help getting shirts off because his head is so big. Oh, I forgot, he does still need our help figuring out which way to put his new big boy underpants on. He gets confused with front and back - but even that he's catching on! :-) My little boy is so grown up and doesn't need mommy's help, I think I'm going to cry! Good thing I'll soon have a new little one that will need lots of my help. Actually I shouldn't be feeling like this, it is truely a blessing that Charles and Ryan are now so independant. I will most likely need to be nursing the baby in the morning and probably will not be able to help the boys get dressed near as much as I have in the past. I will just supervise the opperation.

The other news is that I just signed Charles up for soccer this spring. I'm so excited that he'll get to do something special. He loved soccer camp last year and we were late signing him up so he never actually made it on a team, but this year I'm on top of things! The season falls right when I'll be on maternity leave so I should be able to take him to all of his practices and games without any problems. I could have signed Ryan up too, but decided that we should wait a little longer as I didn't want to be overwhelmed with keeping up with two practice and game schedules and caring for a newborn all while recovering from a c-section etc. I want this to be enjoyable - not a chore. And Ryan still enjoys watching his brother play and can practice with him in our backyard etc. One day it will be Ryan's turn, and maybe soccer or maybe even a different sport - who knows.

Okay, that's probably a long enough update for now. The next one might be a birth announcement with lots of cute baby pictures!!! :-)

Doctor's Appointment

I had my routine appointment with my Obstetrician today and took Charles with me since it was a Teacher's Workday and he didn't have school. He could have gone to daycare, but I thought it would be fun to have a special day together. He came to my doctor's appointment with me after we dropped Ryan off at daycare. I was so impressed with Charles' behavior, he acted perfectly. Almost to the point of crossing his legs and putting his hands in his lap - and all of this on his own without any prompting from mom! He actually told me in the car that he was going to either stand still or sit still, and that he hadn't quite yet decided which one he would do. His reasoning was that he had learned both of those abilities. Lol! Sure enough, as soon as we were called back to see the doctor Charles immediately sat down in the chair and put his hands straight down by his sides with his palms against the sides of his pants. He sat like that the whole time! Between the time that the nurse left and the doctor came in, I asked Charles where he learned to be so still and then I asked if his teacher taught him in school. He said "no mommy, I just thinked it in my brain!". Lol! So he invented how to be still on his own. :-) Night and day from his little brother. But there is still hope, as I don't think Charles was quite this well behaved two years ago either.

Oh I guess I should say something about my appointment. Everything is so normal that there is hardly anything to talk about. Seriously though, I'm not complaining!!!! My weight gain is good, blood pressure is still good, passed my glucose test and any other tests that I have taken so far, the baby is a stroooong kicker and kicks often, and I'm not having contractions, or none that are regular and occur more than 4 in an hour. I am having occasional troubles with allergies and with heartburn but my doctor has prescribed some medicines that seem to be working well. Anyways, there was nothing new to report from today's visit. Everything still looks good. I'm now on a 2-week visit schedule and will be for the next 6 weeks, after which I'll switch to weekly appointments. I did take some time after the appointment to stop by the anesthesiologist and pre-register at the hospital. Both of those took less than 30 mins combined. I guess by the 3rd kid they have all of the info in their database and it's just a matter of adding the new baby's due date and checking that the insurance hasn't changed. So, I'm all set if this baby comes early - oh except for the fact that I don't have a bag packed, don't have the bassinet set up, don't have a car seat... don't have any names picked out.... hmm, we have some work to do.