Two months (2 weeks late!)

Wow, I am getting further and further behind at this blogging thing.  I actually took Ava's two month pictures but hadn't posted them here. 

What Ava is doing now:

-still nursing 99.9% of the time....need to get her to start taking a bottle again!

-holding her head with a little more control

-loves to smile at anyone who will make eye contact with her

-will strike up a conversation with just about anyone too

-sleeps for about 7 hours, although two nights ago she slept for 9!!  

-still not very good about naps during the day

-she is held most of the time while she is awake thanks to all of her big sisters

-enjoys her new bouncy seat that our friend Nikki let us borrow (thanks!!)

-still spits up about every other feeding

-she can definitely recognize her mommy and daddy's voices and will look around the room to find us

 We are just enjoying our summer.  Every day the girls want to know what sort of fun thing we are going to do today.  Some of those fun things included, trips to the beach, some pool hopping and park days with our small group.  Another fun adventure has been Fredrick Meijer Gardens.  Terry's work offered through e-mail a season's pass there.  Terry responded within a minute of him posting it and the big guy said the tickets were ours.  I am really looking forward to going there in the winter to escape the frigid temperatures.  I was able to take some cute photos of 4/5 of the girls while we were there.  

Well, I am done with this posting...there are more things I would write but there is just not enough time in the day to keep up with this now.  I am loving having the girls home and cannot believe they will be on their way back to school in a month.  We will enjoy the rest of our summer....until next time:-)  

One Month Old

Ok, so I was never very good with keeping the girls baby books up-to-date.  So I will try this instead:)  Another blog that I follow took a picture every month of their baby girl with her in the same position.  Very cute!!  So here goes, starting with the first month two days late!!  

What you are doing now....

You love to be held...doesn't matter who.

You started smiling at a week old...and no, it wasn't gas!  

You barely fit into 3 month clothes (they are big on you!), unlike your sisters who went to 3-6 month clothes after one week!

You recognize and smile when you hear your daddy's voice.  

You eat about every three hours but give mommy a little break at night and sleep for 5.  

You spit up a lot, due to reflux and are on medicine to tame it down a little.  

You love your swaddler that Aunt Courtney bought and sleep great at night with it. 

You also love the pacifiers that Aunt Carrie got you.

You love being outside, especially during your nightly fussy time.  

You really enjoy bath time, especially when I wash your hair!  

You have a very helpful big sister, who can make you smile pretty easily.  

Our little photo session did not last long.  Lillian had to be next to her baby sister while she was crying.

Happy one month Ava Grace!! 

All-American Girl

I can not believe it has already been three weeks since our new addition!  Things are slowly forming into our new sense of "normal".  The girls are so much in love with baby Ava, and want to hold and kiss her all the time.  I am still very bad at taking pictures!  The ones below of Ava are when she was a week old.  The one of Lillian is of her sitting next to the beautiful bouquet of flowers I received from Terry's work.  They smelled wonderful!!!  

My mom came for a visit one day and Ava was giving her some smiles!  I kept trying to get it on camera but could not quite capture them!  Did ever say how much I love this stage??!?  I will take the sleepless nights just so I can hold this sweet little girl and have her look adoringly up at me anytime!  

The last week of school, Madelynn was chosen to represent her class in the talent show.  She was so sweet.  I do not think she understood she was going to be doing her "talent" in front of the entire elementary school.  She's learned all sorts of new ways to jump rope.  She is really good at it!  I will try to embed the video I took at it.  Also at the talent show, there was a first grader who sang a song with her dad strumming the guitar.  I had to choke back the tears.  I did not record her singing, I wish I had.  But I did find the song that she sang...listen to words...my all-american girls who adore their all-american dad!  Terry would not trade his girls for the world.  

Ava Grace

Friday May 15th, our fifth daughter was born.  As I sit here and think about the experience, I am in awe...every time it has been so amazing.   My heart is overwhelmed with love for her.  I will just walk through the past few days with pictures as I am not feeling very articulate with my words. 

Right after Ava came out, she had a really difficult time breathing.  There were nurses surrounding her and I had no idea what was going on.  After about 15 minutes of them pounding on her back, and suctioning her nose and mouth, a nurse informed me she was going to have to go to the NIM (neonatal intermediate care unit).  She said it was the step down from NICU.  They were going to be able to observe her more closely and assured me that they would be able to wheel my bed down so I could see her.  Whew, talk about flood of emotions!  I just wanted to hold her....

My sister from CA came and stayed with us a couple of days before the delivery.  I was soo thankful for her!!  She took care of the rest of the crew while Terr spent the night in the hospital with me our first night.  She carted my kids to their soccer and softball games the day after Ava was born.  Thanks again so much Les for your help!!

We tried to get a picture of all five of them...we took about 15 pictures and in EVERY one Lillian could not keep her eyes off her new baby sister.  Isabelle was afraid her head was going to fall off because of how much we told them to be careful with her little neck.  And I think Lillian is crushing Emma's feet, hence her facial expression. 

Next attempt...a little better.  Can't really see little Ava though.

The day that we were suppose to go home she was tested for jaundice and the poor child did not pass this test either.  Sorry, let me back up....after her breathing problems, she had blood sugar problems.  She was being tested every 2 hours to check those levels and we ended up having to supplement formula.  That was another little roller coaster.  Once her blood sugar levels were under control...the jaundice hit.  So here she is under the bilirubin light....she definitely did not enjoy this but in this next picture, I almost think it is a smile....she loves being on her tummy.

Oh, she is such a honey!!

Going home!! They were planning on keeping her and I an extra day because her bilirubin levels were not going down.  They ended up testing her again a little earlier that day and they went down slightly and said we could go home!  Woo hoo!  That nights sleep was awesome!

I am sure that this baby will be held often as this is the first question they ask me every time they see her.  Lillian has given her too many kisses to count...they are going to be great big sisters!

It's official

Two months after meeting with our realtor, our home is officially "on the market".  We had filled out paperwork a few days ago and yesterday we had the pictures taken.  Can I just tell you...I really hope our home sells quickly.  I was cleaning all day just for pictures!!  But...I am humbly reminded that God has been orchestrating everything.  I had written a note to my Aunt about how amazed I was at how she moved, quite a few times...with small children.  They have six children and I am pretty sure she was pregnant during some of those moves.  Here was a snippit of her note to me....

"...I will tell you what someone just told me this morning. He reminded me that when we pray for that buyer to come, we must truly believe that God will send that buyer. We cannot pray for God to send a buyer and then speak worry and doubt about whether or not a buyer will come when we're talking to friends and family. We must not murmur about being stressed out; rather, we must focus on the strength God is giving us to tackle the task. His words of encouragement were a gentle rebuke to me, which I very much needed. I've been fighting myself on getting things done here so that we can aggressively market this home. I've been focused on every flaw in this house or on the property rather than meditating and speaking out what a beautiful place this is...and it is. And it's in a wonderful location. I've focused on the amount of work to be done being overwhelming rather than keeping a proper perspective and driving forward, pushing myself to accomplish things one step at a time. Be encouraged......Trust God to direct your plans and orchestrate every detail. He knows exactly what you need and when; our job is to ask him for what we need and/or want and believe Him to supply it according to His will. With God all things are possible!"

After yesterday, that was exactly what I needed to hear.  We had gone into this decision pretty confident that these were the steps that God wanted us to take.  There was a lot to do, but we were committed.  All along we had said we were just going to keep taking one step at a time and turn when He wanted us to turn and stop when He wanted us to stop, keep going if we were suppose to keep going.  Somewhere over the last couple of weeks, I lost my crutch that was holding me up.  I mean, seriously, here I am 9 months pregnant and God has completely given me so much energy and motivation to do all the things we have done on our home.  We have painted, decluttered, painted, organized, painted, thoroughly cleaned, and painted some more! The kids have been so patient and have entertained themselves quite well.  I was completely focused and have trusted God for the strength each and every day.  Thanks Aunt Nora for your encouragement.  

God knows where He wants us.  We need to keep trusting Him to get us there.  

I will show some before and after pictures of our home later (sorry Les!).  Our realtor has my little card and all my pictures are on there. God is so good....all the time.   

Sweet Madelynn

Madelynn has had some exciting things happen in the past few weeks.  About a year ago, she was asking us about some of the people that were getting baptized in our church.  Terry and I explained to her what the bible said about baptism and when we were both baptized.  Her response was so genuine as she said, "Well, mommy, I know Jesus and I want to follow Him the rest of my life.  Shouldn't I be baptized?"  She is definitely my most sensitive child with a big heart.  So I knew that it was something that she was serious about.  We waited a little while to see if she would pursue it a little more.  She did....then just about every week she was asking when she could talk to the pastors about it.  She met with one of the pastors at our church and on February 15th, she was baptized.  She was very excited until about 10 minutes before she went in front of the congregation and had to answer some questions.  She stumbled a little, but God knows her heart!  She was very excited to share this special day with both sets of grandparents, an aunt and some cousins.  

March 6th, she celebrated her 8th birthday.  Wow.....I was always told that these years would go by very quickly, and they certainly have.  This year, she was able to have her cousins from California join her for the party.  My sister Leslie and her children flew in last week Wednesday and will be leaving today.  It is alway pretty rough around here a few weeks after the cousins are separated.  I am sure this time will be no different.  The kids have had a great time with them and we had Caleb spend the last night in Michigan here at our house instead of Grandma's.

Kylie had not taken a nap that day.  She slept through a good deal of the dinner, even with all the commotion!

Birthday cake-chocolate cake, chocolate filling and chocolate frosting...girl after my own heart.  Kailyn was sweet, as I was snapping photos she throws her arm around Madelynn and says, "Aunt Jessi, take a picture like this!" 

And of course a party would not be complete without a little swimming.  At one point, we had 13 kids in the pool.  I do not even think grown-ups dare to step foot in the water when there are that many kids.  They will be swarmed with little bodies!

Our house is coming along...Terry has finished our new floors.  We have yet to finish the cabinets.  The paint fumes were a little too much in the closed up house.  So we are putting that on hold until the weather becomes a little warmer.  Then we will finish the doors and drawers in the garage.  I love it!  Terry has done a great job and really has paid attention to the little details!  Can't wait to show off more pictures.....but my house is still a disaster zone!  Here are some little snippets.  

We decided to do a darker finish of laminate and paint our baseboards, trim and all the doors on the main floor.  Yes, it has been a ton of work, but well worth the effort.  

We finally upgraded our hardware...we had been living with these ugly mushroom knobs, that I swore would be the first thing I would update when we moved in 6 years ago.  We recently upgraded all of our door handles to oil-rubbed bronze and thought we would stay consistent with our door pulls.  All of our hinges, I ended up spray painting.  I was a little nervous about it, but they turned out very nice.  They did not have a color that would match the oil-rubbed bronze, so I primed them with and orangey-red and then finished them with a really dark brown.  They turned out awesome and saved us about 70 dollars!

I can not wait to have my kitchen back though.  I know it takes time, and I can be patient...but wow, I really appreciate a functional kitchen!

What a project!

So, Terry and I have been toying with the idea of moving.  I know I am nuts, three months before our baby will be here.  What has been so neat, is watching the path being paved for us. So we are going to keep taking steps toward this decision until God tells us otherwise.  

I love my house, and am so thankful that we have it.  That being said...there have always been little things that bothered me.  My kitchen was soo dark.  Terry and have had cabinets in our garage for months, maybe even over a year...waiting to do our remodel.  Instead we decided to sell them (craigs list is great!) and use that money to put in new flooring.  Our existing cabinets were in great shape structurally so it would have been a shame to rip them out.  We have decided instead to paint them white.  This is our second set of cabinets we have painted....ugh!!!!!!!  Don't do it!!!  I told Terry I never wanted to paint cabinets again, we were just going to have to buy new ones once ours expired.  Sanding, two coats primer and two coats of the semi-gloss.  But.....they are turning out beautiful and I love them!!!  Here is our kitchen before.  

Here is our kitchen now, not quite done, a lot more to do...but wow, what an improvement!! Yes we are messy painters as you can tell from our counters.  We decided to do just the upper ones and wait to do the lower ones until the floor is ripped out.  I would cry if they were all beat up after the demolition.

Gotta get back to work!  Terry is a slave driver....he is hard worker, and I appreciate that!

Love the Sunshine!

I think I am just like anyone else and look forward to Spring in the month of February.  The sunshine is wonderful today. I love winter though!  It is beautiful watching the snow come down.  The girls love adding on to the huge snow fort we have in our front yard.  I love bundling up in layers, and that is just in my house.  We enjoy traveling out to the lake to look at the frozen waves against the pier.  I would love to teach my children to ice skate one of these years.  Spring will be here soon...and then I love the aromas of the season!  New grass, flowers, blooming trees and chirping birds.  Thank-you God for your beautiful creation that you have given to us to enjoy!  

Laying low...

I have not had too much to blog about lately. I think that is usually the case in January and February. These two months just seem to be really slow...and cold. When we went to California....I knew we were bound to bring back some sort of sickness. Being on airplanes and bodies just plain worn down from time change. Emma started coughing there and really has not stopped even today. Yesterday Isabelle started with it. She is one that I am fairly concerned about during cold season. Diagnosed with asthma and allergies when she was a baby, she has just always had respiratory issues. At 4 am. she came into my room wheezing. I should have known to put a monitor in there last night. Thankfully, she was not crying, which tends to make her little airways even worse. I am very thankful for our nebulizer otherwise we would have been heading to ER. She cooperated like a champ! We had plans this morning that we had to cancel..I was pretty bummed. We are taking it easy all day...which probably means lots of vidoes...I mean how else can you get children to stay this still???

California trip

300 pictures later we are back from our trip.  We had a great time and the weather couldn't have been better.  Although this was their rainy season, and temps are usually high 60's, we had sunny weather everyday, all day, and temps were 80-90!  We loved visiting my sister and bro-in-law.  The kids were having a blast being able to see their cousins first thing in the morning and had a slumber party in their room every night.  Emma and Aubrey were heartbroken the day we had to leave.  I had never seen either one of them cry so hard.  Must be a second born thing....heart wrenching!!  Leslie came with us to the airport.  Before we went through security, Leslie had to pry Emma's little hands out of hers so we could proceed.  The security lady looked at her with concern.  I said, "She does not want to leave."  She said, "Oh, is she afraid of flying?" I responded, "No, she just spent a week with her cousins and does not want to leave them"  She understood completely.  

Each day we had something different planned.  We hit the park the first day and later that night we went out with Robert and Leslie.  She arranged for Robert's cousin and friend to babysit all 7 kids.  They even had them in bed when we returned home!

On our date night, we took a walk down a pier on the ocean.  We saw two pelicans perched up on the roof of a building....

The next day we went to Disneyland.  My sister and her family have a seasons pass there.  They have not been that often and were excited to have their cousins join them.  Leslie and I tried to stay for the fireworks...but the kids were just exhausted.  Actually, I am pretty sure they were cancelled for the night as the Santa Ana wind was hitting pretty hard.  

On Saturday, we went to a National Park that was not far from their home.  The tides were really low and the place was famous for their tide pools.  We saw starfish (sea stars), hermit crabs, sea urchins, and sea anemones.  The temp was probably close to 85 while we were there...but the water was freezing!

On Sunday, we visited John MacArthur's church.  Terry and I loved it.  He is an excellent speaker and we both went away challenged in our spiritual journey.  All of their building are outdoors.  We had to bring all of the kids to four different buildings for children's church.  I was glad we got there early!  After church, we met up with Robert's parents for lunch at Chevy's...has to be one of the best Mexican restaurants ever.  That evening, we went to a different park, got pizza for the kids, and played a little t-ball.  We ended up back home with a little skip-bo and take two and a visit from Robert and Leslie's friend, Amy.  My husband did not last very long, and went to bed early, like just about every other night. I don't think he ever quite made it on California time. 

On Monday, we went back to Disneyland, but hit California Adventure this time.  Terry thought the kids favorite part of the park was Playhouse disney.  They had all the characters on stage and everything was very up close and personnel.  The kids were dancing around and having a great time.  

Tuesday was the day of departure.  We did not need to be to the airport until 8pm so we took advantage of the beautiful weather and headed back a different park this time....it was hot!  The kids never stopped running around.  They could have cared less about the heat.  That is what I miss most about winters in Michigan.  You do not have the luxury of taking off to a park for the morning.  Before naps, we headed across the neighborhood to Robert's grandma, and aunts homes.  They have a common area in their backyard where the kids could ride bikes and run around on the sidewalk.  Then it was home for good naps before our long flight back to MI.  

I wish I could say it was a hassle free-flight....it was anything but!  We were a little worried that it was going to be delayed due to the very cold weather, and snow storm in Michigan.  Thankfully, that was not the case.  However, we checked in, boarded the plane and about 15 minutes after we were settled, the pilot came on the intercom and said he had some bad and good news.  Lillian of course, is out cold in her car seat.  The wheel of the plane apparently had a broken bolt that had to be repaired.  The plane had to be jacked up so all the passengers had to depart.  Grr...so they said, it should only take about 45 minutes to an hour.  2 hours later, we were told we could board the plane again.  Meanwhile, all the kids were sleeping on the floor of the airport...hey at this point, I honestly did not care.  It was 4 am MI time...and we were all tired. We settled back into our seats and about 20 minutes later, the pilot came on the intercom again and said it would take about 5-6 minutes for the crew that fixed the wheel to finish up the paperwork and we would be on our way....another hour went by and we finally left the airport.  The girls all slept on the plane, on and off of course and we landed in Detroit at 9am.  We took the shuttle to our van, loaded up and realized we left Madelynn's Nintendo DS on the plane with about 10 games.  We drove back to the airport, and thankfully they had it waiting at the gate!  Maddie was very relieved....

So here were are in 10 degree temps...but it is good to be back into routine.  It was a great vacation and we were so glad that we had the opportunity to go!  Thanks for having us Leslie and Robert!

Our sweet baby ??

Just a quick update before we head out to California.  We had our 20 week ultrasound yesterday.  It does not matter how many children you have or how many ultrasounds you have, but seeing your sweet baby all snuggled up in your womb overwhelms me with emotion.  I LOVE it!!  How  can anyone mistake this miraculous process as something steming from evolution??  Every organ system that has to be working a certain way, or it just does not function.  I have heard many stories of physicians, that while going through med school, study and analyze the human body and are convinced that there has to be a creator.  

I can not believe we made it through the entire ultrasound without asking to know the gender!  We told her from the beginning that we did not want to know.  She informed us that we should probably turn our heads as she was measuring the femur....so we did.  I asked if she could tell and she said "yes".  Then that was it!  Whew....now we can wait four more months to find out!  We are both very excited and neither one of us have a clue what it is. (Of course girl is always in the forefront of our mind!)  I tried straining my eyes to see if I could see anything, but we were dealing with a seasoned ultrasound tech.  She was fast...  I am off to pack and clean, clean, clean, before we head out this afternoon!  Please pray for our flight!  We leave at 8pm.  and then head home on Tuesday next week with our flight leaving at 1am Michigan time.  Lillian is my wild card....I pray that the girl just sleeps!  

I think I'm in love....

Having a nice camera makes me want to take lots and lots of pictures!!  Instead of cleaning my house like I should be doing, I dragged my daughter outside to take some pictures of her new haircut.  You can not really tell from the front, but the back is so cute!  I had her stack it....I know, on a 7 year-old?  But her hair is so incredibly thick, we have been trying some different things with it.  I think we found the best cut on her.  

Here are some pictures of Lillian's party the other night, she loved being the center of attention!

Happy Birthday Lillian!

Today is my baby's second birthday!  We will be celebrating it at Grandpa and Grandma's house with her cousin Mason who is turning 6 today.  I think it is sweet that he still wants to share his special day with his much younger cousin!  She received her first official haircut today (from her mother), and took it like a champ.  Well, with a little help from Dora! 

Minus the drool on her her chin, this was a cute picture I took of her after her haircut!  I hate cutting bangs, but I can not bring myself to pay 10 dollars to take her somewhere to have them do it!  Especially when in another month, she will need another trimming!

I had to post some photos that I took last night at my parents house of the kids swimming in the pool.  I have tried to get some good shots with my old camera, and they always came out with the wrong coloring or somewhat blurry.  I am looking forward to learning more about my camera to capture these moments that seem to pass us by so quickly.

We are looking forward to ringing in the new year with friends from our church....good friends and good food...what more can you ask for?!??  Have a safe and happy new year!