Wednesday, August 11, 2010

10 Years!


On this day 10 years ago, I married my best friend. Happy Anniversary, Babe!


God has blessed me tremendously with a dedicated husband and loving father to our 3 biggest blessings!

I am so excited to see what God has in store for us in the next 10 years...and more!


Friday, July 30, 2010

Our 7 month old saved us $70 today!

Our sweet girl just saved us $70 today! She is acting like her normal self again after 2 days of a high fever and being very lethargic. Therefore I don't have to pay our insanely high copay to take her to see the doctor. Thank you Shiloh and Happy 7 Months!

This is a picture of Shiloh a week ago when she tried her first food, baby cereal, and did NOT like it!

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Wordless Wednesday


Shiloh Grace never ceases to amaze me. I put her on the floor to play and checked on her when I realized she was very quiet. She just decided to take a nap! 
...almost wordless :)

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Riding Bikes

This is at Grammy and Pops house. We had a few close calls on camera...and a couple good crashes off camera. Thank goodness for helmets!

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Grandma and Grandpa

My parents are visiting for a few days and all regular activities seem to stop when that happens. I want to sit and enjoy the time with them. I want to soak it all up. Living far away from them is tough.

My niece was telling me how it was going to be so difficult to not see them for a few weeks, because they live near each other and get to see Grandma and Grandpa on a regular basis. She asked how we can do it, living so far away and not getting to see them very often.

I guess you get into the grind of daily life and just deal with it. When the opportunity arises to be with them, I'm reminded of what it is that we are missing out on.

Thankfully, we do live near Kurtis' parents and seeing Grammy and Pops (as they are referred to by Malachi and Zoe) is a highlight of many weekends. What a blessing, though, it would be to have the opportunity to live near both Grandparents.

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

A Month Older


In keeping with tradition, here is Shiloh's 6 month post. Yep, she is another month older
and just as love-able as ever! Here's what she's been up to lately...

  • sucks on 2-3 fingers to self-soothe
  • rolling front-to-back-to-front
  • showing the first signs of trying to army crawl but not moving
  • loves to blow bubbles/make raspberries
  • has had a few swimming lessons already and seems to enjoy the pool at Tessa's house
  • just got her first "new"(not hand-me-down) toy, Sophie the Giraffe, which was a total splurge but worth every penny cause she LOVES it! (and thanks to our good friend Taffy we did not lose her tonight!)
  • Wearing a baltic amber teething necklace full-time now. With such a content and happy baby it's a little difficult to tell if it's working but even if it's not it looks so darn cute!
  • Still as cute as a button in her fluffy, cloth diapered bottom. 
  • Not always sleeping through the night now =/ but that's okay since she is such a sweet cuddler
  • Starting to sit up, but is still working on those abs
  • Beginning to show interest in food, but we'll try to wait a bit longer...that just creates one more thing to think about and, really, I don't think she's starving.

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

5 Months




I can hardly believe it was 5 months ago that Shiloh Grace was born. She is an absolute joy. She continues to be our sleep-through-the-night, content and happy little girl. I think she is beginning to teethe so these may be some of the last gummy photos we take of her.

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Pics of my handsome bro






Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Simple joys

We have been busy with many different things lately and I missed Shiloh's 4 month post. So I thought I would post this video I got of her rolling over. The simple joys are such a blessing!

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Our Girls: 2 years and 3 months


What a blessing these two girls are for our family!

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

2 Months


It is amazing that Shiloh is already 2 months old! She is such a sweet addition to our family. She continues to live up to her name and is a very content and 'peaceful' baby. She sleeps so well I still have not gotten used to it! I constantly check on her for fear that something is wrong...do babies REALLY sleep in 3 and 4 hour chunks?! Until Shiloh I thought not! She does love to sleep in our bed at night though, but she isn't doing it to nurse nonstop like Malachi did, she seems to just enjoy getting her cuddle time with mama and papa all to herself.

She is cooing and smiling, always a treat to begin to have that kind of interaction with a little baby. She's lifting her head up while on her tummy and seems to enjoy tummy time in general.
At her 2 month appointment on Tuesday we found out she's in the 95th percentile for length and weight. Gotta love her chunks!

Malachi and Zoe continue to love on, and when I say "on" I really mean ON, her :). Let's just say that the phrase "Give her space" is said many, many times a day! But I am oh so grateful that they adore her.

Thursday, February 4, 2010

Sibling Love


Malachi and Zoe have been doing an amazing job of playing together. I love that they can be in the back yard and enjoy time on the trampoline, in the sandbox or digging in the dirt...together!

UPDATE: Right after I posted I heard screaming from the back, only to find out that they were throwing sand at each other. So, it is not always peaceful between them, it's more of a love-hate thing but at least the love part is becoming more and more common...I think...gotta go cause I hear more screaming. :)

Saturday, January 30, 2010

1 Month and Birthmarks

Our sweet and beautiful Shiloh is already a month old!


So I was playing around with the camera after taking pictures today and saw I could fix the red eye with it (the camera) rather than doing it on the computer.
Well apparently it does not distinguish between eyes and birthmarks, or at least Shiloh's birthmark. ;)
On that note...
Many of our friends have asked about Shiloh's birthmark so I thought it may be helpful to disperse the information via our blog for those that are curious.
It is what some call a strawberry birthmark, also known as a hemangioma.

Basically it's a grouping of blood vessels. No one is quite sure what causes them to occur. It will grow for approximately one year, then there is a resting period and then it will slowly fade (at least this is what I have read, I'm sure there are variations of this timeline).
50% of hemagiomas are gone by age 5.

Here is Shiloh's birthmark progression...

In the hospital, the day she was born.
She had a very small purple-ish dot, barely visible in this picture.

2 weeks

1 month
Today was probably the first day I could feel that it is slightly raised, about a week ago I could see texture in it but it still was smooth to the touch.

Monday, January 25, 2010

Picture Summary

First time holding Shiloh. Very proud to be big brother (again) and big sister!
Take note of Shiloh's amazing tan...or jaundice.At Shiloh's 3 day appointment we found out her bililevels were at 19.2 and we were admitted to Downey Kaiser to put her under the bili lights to get her levels down. The little velcro circles were glued onto her head so she could sport...
...these cool sunglasses. :) We were in the hospital 2 nights and finally got to go home when her levels were down to 10.7 (the whole thing was a bit of a rollercoaster and I will spare you the details cause I don't have the time or energy to write about it).
We got a visit from the Fieldhouses. Molly Grace was born 10 days before our Shiloh Grace, they are 2nd cousins, or at least I think that's the relation. :) (Not sure what the wet spot on my shirt is...pee or spit-up I suppose)
First bath, she loved getting her hair washed.
Sisters.
Proud big brother.
She's still a little jaundiced but clearly eating very well, note the chubby cheeks, :) and working on getting it out of her system.

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Shiloh's Birth

All 3 kids just went down for a nap so I thought I would take a moment to post Shiloh's birth story before the details of it fade. Most people that read our blog have probably already heard all this but I wanted to write it down for my own record as well. :)

On Tuesday, Dec. 29, I had my 39 week appointment. I had to see a NP instead of my midwife because my midwife, Cheryl Pearce, was not in the office due to being on vacation...or so I thought. Anyway, I went in to see a very nice NP and was told I was 1cm dilated and 40% effaced. I went home and decided to take castor oil (even though every person I had asked about it had warned me against it). It was my brothers last night staying with us and if taking the castor oil could send me into labor then he would be there conveniently to stay with Malachi and Zoe. If it didn't start labor than at least it would clear out my system. ;)

So here is the timeline:

2:00pm Took 2 Tablespoons of castor oil mixed in orange juice which was no where near as gross as many on the internet made it out to be. My research said to take 2-4 T and I did play it safe and stuck to the lower end.

3:30pm - 5:00pm Took a nap, nothing was happening.

5:30pm We decided to go get food at Open Sesame. Wound up getting it to go cause I was beginning to feel sick to my stomach.

6:45pm Got home, tried to eat but didn't feel well. I only had 3 small bites of my favorite restaurant food, big red flag...

7:oopm Went to the bathroom...got cleared out from the bottom end but still felt icky.

7:30pm Went to the bathroom...got cleared out from the top end...can't remember the last time I threw up like that...felt much better! That was the end of the bathroom escapades for me so not too bad. :)

8:00pm Feeling contractions every 2-4 minutes but nothing intense.

9:00pm-ish Started packing hospital bag just in case. Big difference from my first pregnancy...I think the bag was packed 2 or 3 weeks before I delivered :)

11:30pm Went to the hospital. Contractions were still relatively minor but consistent enough that I wasn't really sleeping and due to Zoe's labor only lasting 4 hours we were concerned about getting to the hospital in time.

12:00am Got to Kaiser, checked in at triage and found out my midwife, Cheryl Pearce, was there until 8am! (If you are unfamiliar with Kaiser...you can see the same person throughout your pregnancy but will be delivered by whoever is at the hospital) She checked me and I was only 3cm. We chose to walk around for an hour...which turned into a little longer, I really did not want to be sent home.

2:30am Got checked again. 4cm, 80% effaced. We opted to have Cheryl strip my membranes and walk some more.

4:30am Got checked again in triage, 5cm, so we got admitted! Yay!

5:00am My contractions were still a little inconsistent so we had Cheryl break my bag of waters...I was trying to get this baby out before 8am. :) Cheryl asked if she could pray for us, so we held hands with her and one of my nurses while she prayed for a safe delivery!

5:30am I was having back labor and decided to get in the shower. Stayed in there about an hour. It felt great on my back but I could still tell the contractions were not intense enough ie I had not hit transition yet.

7:00am Got checked...7cm...Cheryl had me turn on my left side and showed Kurtis how to apply counter pressure. She said it would help my contractions work more efficiently...boy was she right! Cheryl started dressing to deliver me and Kurtis later told me he was a little doubtful that I was that close to delivering but then again Cheryl proved to be correct!

7:50am-ish Cheryl had me get on my elbows and knees and asked me to try pushing. I was a little leary when she said it but I went ahead. After 2 pushes she told Kurtis to look. He says he expected to see Shiloh's head crowning and was shocked to see her head was out. One more push and she was out, with Kurtis helping to deliver her!

Shiloh Grace was born at 7:59am on December 30. 1 week before her due date(good thing since she was already 8lbs 10oz), before the new year, delivered by my midwife before 8am, and as if that wasn't enough blessing...I didn't even tear! This was one of the biggest blessings considering what happened in Shiloh's first week, but that is another post...not to mention2 of the 3 kids are now awake. :)