December to January

Somebody asked me the other day what I've been up to the past few weeks....what on Earth is keeping me so busy? These two kiddos have literally kept my hands full. In the past month we had five Christmas celebrations, James had his first stomach flu experience, I had a 24-hour bug, James fractured his foot, and we've all been battling a yucky cold bug for weeks! In addition to that, Clara is more and more alert every week. This is a LOT of fun for us but also makes it more difficult as I'm learning how to delegate my time between two children!

Here are several pictures from the past month....

James is obsessed with 'helping' in the kitchen. I'm learning to be more flexible and he's learning a lot about cooking! He loves to say " raw chicken! need salt! very hot! be careful!" Here he was helping my mom and me make ham sandwiches for my grandmother's birthday party. His job was to peel off the wax paper between the swiss slices and throw it away. He was listening to silly songs while he worked. :)

James has painted a few times. He likes to use the brush but refuses to finger paint. It sort of surprised me! He did, however, desperately want squeeze the paint out of the bottle by himself...am I a bad mother for not letting him?

We celebrated Christmas with Mark's family first. Here is my dear mother-in-law. We have been following her through quite the journey lately! Less than a week ago, Lois had major surgery to remove cancer from her right lung. She has been so brave and strong. The surgery was successful but there is still quite a bit of recovery to deal with. Please pray for her as she is recovering and still in the hospital.

Our annual hand bell and caroling at the nursing home

After getting his cool blue cast on, we had to keep James off his feet for a few days. Here he had fun making gingerbread cookies with my parents a few days before Christmas.

My grandmother turned 80 on Christmas Day. We had quite the party to celebrate the day after!

James and Clara with their cousin Annie, my brother's daughter. James had fun playing with Annie!...perhaps too much fun? He passed his cold on to her. :(

This was the best we could do for a Christmas picture of our family. Kind of pitiful, huh? It is very typical, though. James is nearly always checking on Clara, touching Clara, hugging Clara, poking Clara....and she just tries to take it all in.

My extended family...grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins...the works!

The week following Christmas my girlfriend Amy was available one afternoon before heading home so a few of us got together. As you can see from the picture, we all have kids and are all busy mamas now! It was great to catch up a little!

10 weeks old

11 weeks

How We Feel....

We've had a lot of these moments lately....James had his first tummy sickness a week ago, followed by myself a few days after. Then over the weekend while celebrating Christmas with Mark's family James fractured a bone in his foot when he fell off a chair! I feel like I'm going crazy (almost) keeping James off his feet so the swelling will go down and he can get a permanent cast. Hopefully today that will happen! On a side note, don't you love the hair bow on Clara? Thank you, Grandma and Grandpa! We had a wonderful time with Mark's family and everybody was SO helpful with both of the kids!

James in his temporary splint/wrap thing. He has taken it off several times on his own because he doesn't like it!

Christmas Deer & Thanksgiving Catch-Up

We've been a family of four for six weeks now...time is flying, as always. Can't believe our little girly is smiling already! We've noticed a big change in her in the past week, as she's awake and alert for longer periods of time and has introduced a consistent 'fussy time' every evening. However, the trade off is that she's sleeping a 7 or 8 hour stretch at night! Woo-hoo!
Clara's six week picture.

The highlight of James' Thanksgiving had to be receiving his Christmas deer from Great-Grandma and Great-Papa. You should have seen him jumping and shouting with glee! It was so cute.
As I type, Clara is waking up from a little nap, so I'll have to neglect captions for the rest of these...enjoy!

Clara, 9 Days Old

http://www.sorellimages.com/claranewborn/

Click on the link above to see a slide show of pictures our friend Sarah Sorell took of Clara. These were taken when she was just 9 days old! I can't believe she is now one month. I'll post some of her one-month pictures (not nearly as exciting or professional) later this week!

The Kids

It's funny how we've transitioned into using this phrase "the kids". Still adjusting to the reality that we've got two children! Miss Clara Marie is FOUR weeks old already. She'll be one month old on Thanksgiving day.

James is loving his sister. I'm constantly catching him rushing to her bouncy seat when she cries, to push her pacifier into her mouth. He also loves giving her kisses, sweet little boy. Sometimes he's a little rough with her, but we're working on that.

When you ask James to make a funny face, this is the expression he comes up with, accompanied by a funny little head shake.

James learned how to pedal on his tricycle! (thanks to his sweet cousins who handed it down to him!) Mark taught him this new skill and rushed up to the door to tell me the day it happened. It was sweet to see Mark so proud of his boy!

Our baby girl has been a great sleeper so far, consistently going five hour stretches between feedings at night! She's very good natured and we love her!

We're looking forward to spending time with these two (and other family members) over Thanksgiving!

We attempted a "Christmas card" family photo Sunday afternoon...this was the best we could come up with...

Trick or Treat

So this was obviously a few weeks ago...but I just wanted to share James' first Trick-or-Treat experience. He totally got into it. My parents' house was our first stop, followed by several homes in the neighborhood our friends live in. He referred to it as "Cookie Treat" or "Trick or Please" a few times, which was pretty cute.

Clara's Arrival

This photo was taken just before heading to the hospital at 2:23am (see clock) October 16th.....NINE DAYS before Clara was born. We had a 'test run' as my doctor called it, false labor. My contractions that entire night had been close together but not too painful, so I was a little doubtful. We ended up losing a night of sleep and being sent home from the hospital to wait and wait and wait!

At 41 weeks, we were beginning to think we'd have to induce if we wanted to meet Clara...we would have had to decide on Tuesday, the 26th, but didn't have to because the morning of the 25th I woke up with signs that Clara was most likely coming on her own! That Monday my mom came to pick James and myself up and we walked and shopped at three different stores. I still wasn't having consistent contractions but had a hunch that things were in the works!

During James' nap, I was watching a show on our computer when my water broke, at 3:15pm! Since my water never broke with James, this was such a different experience! I'll spare the details. After multiple phone calls (it was fun to get to call Mark at work and share the news, and have him hop in the car ASAP) and having my mom over to pick up James, we were packed in the car and headed to the hospital 45 minutes later. (With just two minor hiccups; our garage door spring broke AND our car battery had died and needed to be jumped....seriously, what timing!?!)
Thankfully my contractions didn't begin to pick up and really hurt til the car ride there, around 4:15pm. Since my water had already broken, I was immediately admitted this time, although still barely dilated at 1.5cm.

The next several hours were a blur. Contractions picked up and I progressed quickly, from 2 to 6cm in just an hour and a half. I had planned on getting up to walk after they had monitored Clara for a while, but by the time I had the go-ahead, I was in too much pain to do so. After an epidural at 7:15, I was dilated 7cm and 100% effaced. Just an hour later they had me start pushing and Clara was born at 9:24pm. 8lbs, 10.5ounces. 20 inches long.

Such a healthy little girl!

We had more visitors than I could count our second night in the hospital, with most of Mark's family making the trip to meet Clara. We felt so loved and supported! Above is our 4 generation photo, just like we took with James after he was born.

Speaking of James, he's had the biggest adjustment of all, I'd say. He's had some 'off' behavior, but loves Clara. He tries to share snacks and his sippy cup with her, likes to push her in the swing (a little too hard!), loves to kiss her (which is why, I'm sure, she has a cold already), and poke at her eyes. I'm learning to be patient with him as he learns how to treat her! Overall, we've felt so blessed with how smoothly things are going, though.

Dressing little girls is so much fun! I know everybody says it, but it's true! I feel like changing her whole outfit every diaper change, just for the fun of it (but usually don't ...Mark would think I'm crazy!).

Tiny, tiny feet.

Clara's one-week photo. In her first week, we had many visitors, attended church and a Halloween party with our Community Group. So much to look forward to!! We love little Clara Marie!