Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I hope everyone has a wonderful day today. Don't forget to take some time to think about what you are most thankful for.

As for me here are just some of the things I am thankful for...
Jesus dying on the cross for MY sins,
My parents for giving me life,
My loving husband,
Owen, Ava, and Ezra,
My Family and Friends,

Our home,

Our Church,

Luke having a great job,
Being a Stay at Home Mom,
My Freedom!

2 Weeks

Ezra is two weeks old!

Bad Hair Day

Ava's hair looked like this when I got her out of her crib this morning. I guess she is not going to be blessed with get up and go hair. Nope she will be like her Mommy who either has to wash, blow dry, and straighten it with a flat iron every morning to make it look decent or become a pony tail girl. I am a pony tail kind of girl most days because I am either too busy or too lazy to do any thing else!

Monday

It's Monday again. Weekends never seem long enough for our family! No pictures today just an update.

Thursday Luke and I went to our first ever parent teacher conferences. Owen is doing really well in his preschool class. It is crazy how well his teacher who only spends 6 hours a week with him truly understands what makes Owen, Owen. She understands that Owen loves to have lots and lots of attention. On top of that she knows that if he isn't receiving positive attention he is more than okay to have negative attention. She seems to really enjoy having Owen in her class and that makes me extremely happy. I would hate to be sending our child some where that he is not liked or understood.

Friday morning Ezra had his two week check up. (half a week early) He weighs 8 pounds 6 ounces. His Doctor commented on how easy going he is. I am praying that will stick with him as he grows up. Friday at 5:00 Luke made a trip with his Mom into the emergency room. He is fine but I sure was scared for a while. In about 2 hours time he had tingling/numbness in his right hand and fingers and also on the right side of his lips, tongue, teeth and throat. This was then followed by a migraine that caused him to lose vision in his right eye. They did blood work and an MRI and are certain that what he experienced was a complex migraine. They released him from the ER with orders to see a neurologist in the next week. Luke does have migraines often and if he doesn't take something right away for it he does have problems with his vision. The whole tingling/numbness thing was something new and I hope it doesn't continue to happen in the future.

Saturday was a really low key day because Luke's head and eyes were still hurting from his migraine.

Sunday Just Owen and I went to church. Luke was on call this weekend and he had to work out some problems that came up as we were walking out the door to go to church. So, Luke stayed home with Ava and Ezra and took care of his work issues. After nap time we went on our first public outing with all three kids. It started out great, but by the time we were past ready to leave it was a disaster. We went to a furniture store to look at big girl beds for Ava. Wow that was an experience. As we walked in people probably thought that is such a cute family and by the time we left people I'm sure thought wow that is an out of control family! Oh well it could have been a lot worse.

Chapstick Girl

Ava loves to put chapstick on. She probably has the smoothest lips in town. She even likes to put on Grandma Annette's icky Carmex chapstick. Grandma is nicer than me though when it comes to putting on chapstick. Grandma lets her just have it to put on and walk around with where as I only let her use a little bit of mine and I closely monitor her while she is doing it so she doesn't destroy it. The tube in this picture is Grandma Annette's and it ended up with a huge finger gouge in it!

John Deere Boys

Ezra got this hat as a gift from one of our friends and Owen thought it was the greatest gift ever. As soon as he saw it he thought it needed to be on Ezra's head. So, here he is with his John Deere hat. It is a bit big yet. It will probably fit him good this summer. The tractor in Owen's had is also Ezra's but Owen has kind of taken it over. Sometimes when Owen is done playing with it he will bring it to Ezra and put it on his tummy so he can have a turn too! Oh, and Owen's sweatshirt is also a John Deere shirt that he got from his Papa John. It says if it's not a Gator, it's a Croc.

1 week

Ezra was one week old yesterday. I thought I would do a little photo shoot to mark the day, but Ezra was very sleepy. The little peek with one eye in the last picture was the closest thing to an awake picture I could get!

The Kids

The Boys snuggled up in their blankies!

Ava came to join her brothers!

Ava has definitely taken the role as Mommy!

Group Hug!

Tuesday

Tomorrow is a day full of changes for our family, and to be honest I am scared and sad. Luke is going back to work tomorrow after being home with us for the last 3 weeks. (Can you believe that I am crying as I write this entry) So off to work Luke will go tomorrow in the early morning while the rest of us are still sleeping. Owen has been glued to Luke's side every day over the past three weeks so this change will be especially hard for him. Luckily Owen has school in the morning so that will make it a little easier for him to deal with the changes. As for Ava she too has had her fair share of Daddy time. Daddy tends to spoil her a bit much so our little princess will have her struggles and melt downs too! Even Ezra will have change in his life he might not get the immediate service he is currently receiving. He might have to cry a little bit while I am helping his big brother and sister with things. As for me I will probably struggle the most. I will not have Luke to help me with all of our daily tasks like meals, cleaning, laundry, running Owen to and from school, naps, getting the kids dressed, well just about every thing. I wont have the two extra hands that I came to rely on over the last 3 weeks. I really wish Luke could just continue working from home like he has been for the last three weeks. I love having him here every day with us. I'm not sure Luke feels the same way I do, and I know the guys he works with are more than ready for him to be back. Well any way like I said things are going to be different here for all of us tomorrow and whether I am ready or not tomorrow will come sooner than I would like.

Compare the three

All three pictures were taken the day we brought them home from the hospital!

Going Home

Luke and Ava came to pick us up yesterday while Owen was at school. Ava was excited to bring her baby brother home!

First Day Home

Ezra and I came home yesterday afternoon. It was really nice to be home and be a family again. Owen is being a stinker, but Ava is doing really really well. She loves her new baby brother. Owen is struggling with his behavior it is like he is starving for attention and doesn't seem to mind that he is getting negative attention from us. He loves his brother a lot and has made the comment that we are not going to share him with anyone. We just really need to find a new normal for Owen. He is very much a routine kind of a kid!

Ezra Harvey

Our baby boy is finally here! I went from no contractions and feeling fine to an instant hard 5 minute apart contractions. They started at 8:55 a.m. Owen was already at school so we just had to drop Ava off at Jenny's house so we could get to the hospital. We arrived at the hospital at about 10 a.m. The on call Dr. called my O.B. who had the day off and she wanted to come in and deliver our baby so we put off breaking my water til she arrived. Ezra was born at 12:25pm on Tuesday November 10th. It was a a nice fast delivery. Everything went really well with no complications. Luke and my Mom were in the delivery room with me and did a great job helping out! Ezra weighed 7 pounds 14 ounces and was 20 inches long. Uncle Kurt came to visit us right away and then ate lunch with Luke and my Mom. Around 4:30 our Pastor and his wife came to visit us and pray for us and to let us know that they would be bringing us dinner on Friday. Then Luke's parents came and brought Owen and Ava with them. They both were really excited to see him. Owen got pretty sad when he found out I was not coming home with them.

This morning Luke came up to spend the day with me and Ezra. Grandma Ruth took the kids for us for the day. Great Grandpa Harvey and Great Grandma Joan came to visit us for a while.

We should be going home sometime tomorrow morning.

Saturdays Project

Oh no, Daddy put a big hole in our house!

Luke ripped our patio door out today. Owen wasn't quite sure if it really should have been taken out. So now we have a huge hole in our living room that is covered up with plywood for the time being.

Leaves

Can you see us!

The weather was amazing on Friday, so our kids spent a lot of time playing outside. I decided to spend some time outside too. So I parked myself into a chair and watched Owen and Ava play in the leaves. They made a huge pile to jump in thanks to a little raking help from Daddy. At the end they decided I needed to be in the leaves too, so they raked a big pile around me and then jumped in!

38 Weeks

I had my 38 week appointment this morning. It went well. I am now dilated to 5 can you believe it. Seriously this baby is going to fall out of me the second I go into labor. I am starting to think the reason he isn't coming out yet is my fault, because from day one of this pregnancy even though I was told I was due on the 18th of November I kept telling myself that November 5th would be a great birthday for him. Why on earth I chose the 5th I'm not sure it just sounded like a good day. So maybe tomorrow he will make his big entrance into the world and have the birth date that I predicted from the beginning. We'll see what happens. Oh, and Luke went with me to this appointment so he could harass my Doctor for a while. He always makes my appointments very interesting with all his weird questions. I haven't mentioned this yet either, since I have been put on bed rest a week ago ladies from our church have been bringing us dinner to help us out. We are very grateful that we go to such an awesome church and have a wonderful loving church family. We have had lasagna, stuffed pork chops, tacos, chili, and tonight we have another meal being delivered. Oh, and I'm sure Luke and I are putting on lots of pounds because they all bring delicious goodies with their meals and heaven forbid we let them go to waste!

Our baby

Still no baby. All of us are tired of waiting you probably are too. Luke has been home now for a full week doing my job and helping me out. Owen asks at least 5 times a day when his baby brother is going to come out or he will make comments that he just wants to see his brother. He also tells me he doesn't want my stomach to hurt any more so the baby has to come out. Even Ava seems to finally understand that there is a baby in my tummy. She will point to my belly when we ask her where the baby is. We bought this cradle at Luke's Grandparents auction back in September. Luke and I fell in love with it so we bought it and then we had Grandma Ruth make the mattress, fitted sheet, and a bumper pad for it. It is in our bedroom just waiting for our baby boy to sleep in it. A little history for you: This cradle was the same cradle that Luke's Grandpa Harvey slept in when he was a baby, and Grandpa Harvey's mom also slept in it when she was a baby. I can't believe how sturdy it is considering how old it is. It definitely was taken care of over the years. Who knows maybe our Grandchildren will sleep in it too!

Carving Pumpkins!

We had a little Halloween party at our house on Saturday. Grandma Annette came as a pirate, Uncle Kurt was a hunter, and Kristin was a black cat. They came over to our house for a day full of fun activities. Luke and Owen were hunters too, Ava was a bumblebee, and I was dressed as a pregnant lady who was in labor with twins one of which was already out with the umbilical cord still attached. My costume was Luke's idea. I was just going to dress up as a pregnant lady in labor. Any way we started our party off with some coloring. We all colored a Halloween themed picture. Then we moved onto eating! We had a crock pot cook off for lunch. Lots and lots of yummy food! Owen and Ava enjoyed Uncle Kurt's BBQ meatballs and wieners the most. If you ask me it was all to good because I ate way more than I should have. After we ate we carved pumpkins! Owen was so excited about this. He has been talking about carving his pumpkin for weeks. After that mess was cleaned up we moved onto making Carmel apples. They were really tasty. Then Owen and Ava took much needed naps. Kurt and Kristin left us at nap time to go to a football game, but Grandma stayed to go trick or treating with the kids. We went to Papa John's and Grandma Ruth's house first, then went to a few close friends houses. Ava was more interested in eating her treats then getting out of the van and visiting friends! She is our little snack monster. Our last stop was a local pizza shop they were giving out little pizza to kids that stopped in and we also got a pizza to take home and eat for a late dinner. It was a fun packed day for our family.