Our Christmas Miracles!!

Merry Christmas!!!


We started the week off at home in Ohio. We had a great time at my friend Kelly's house. Belle had a BLAST playing with Jayda and Jacey. We had Christmas at Mimi's and Poppy's and then went over to my cousin Chris' for a family get together. Belle had fun playing with her cousin "Shiny" (Cheyanne) and we had to hear Belle whine all the way home that she wanted to go back and play with "shiny".

We came home Christmas Eve night so that we could be home on Christmas morning. Belle had fun opening all the presents. She asked "Belle's?" after each one, making sure it was hers. Her favorite gifts so far have been her dollhouse hands down (from Mimi and Poppy) and then her Hide and Seek Safari game, with her Sit and Spin close behind.

Now for our Christmas miracles. Belle is going diaper free after Christmas. We put some plastic panties on her a couple times and she peed in them. Then while she was running around diaper free one time she stopped playing and ran to the potty and POOPED. Thats a big deal and it was the first time she's done that. We've been setting the timer for 20 min and she's been going pretty well. One time she peed on the floor, stopped it and ran over to the potty and finished. We may just get this done by New Years. I'm so proud of her!

Second, Ethan has been having some reflux troubles and the doctor put him on Reglan and Zantac. I just have to say that Reglan is the devil and after googling it, it scared me to death. It turned Ethan to a little monster, but after I took him off he was his sweet happy self. Now he's been drinking 5-6oz at a time compared to 2-4oz before. I don't know if it's the Zantac or his new bottle. He's been such a happier kid and I'm happy cause he's eating more.

Christmas at Mimi's



Whats a picture of the boys without Brody trying to suck on Ethan's head.


Belle and "Shiny" (Cheyanne)



This is the kids after Belle tried to choke Ethan (see picture at the top)


Our potty training outfit

Eat Boy Eat!!!

Ok so Mister Ethan has been a bear to feed. He's only been eating around 17-20 oz when he should be eating 2.5oz per pound, so atleast 28oz. Come to find out he's got reflux. We tried soy formula with no help and are now on meds, zantac and reglan. Hopefully that makes a difference cause I'm also afraid he's got MSPI (milk soy protein intolerance) and that means we'd have to get the REALLY expensive formula, and I don't want that.

A Freshour Christmas

We celebrated Christmas this past weekend with the Freshour family. Belle is finally getting the hang of the whole present thing. She's getting a lot more excited about all the toys.

And Belle did so well with going to the potty while we were there. Come to think of it, she kept the same pull up dry all day on Sunday. Nap included. I think what helped was that there were more people to hold Ethan and keep an eye on Belle's potty dance. We'll see how well I do when it's just the three of us at home.

The girls got dress up clothes.



Ethan even got in on the fun


Then we made an attempt at a group shot. Turned out ok.

Mmm chocolate cake!!

I made Blueberry muffins yesterday and well Belle loves them. Its probably the only way she gets fruit, except for juice. Ha Ha. Although I'm afraid she likes it for all the wrong reasons.

The first time she had one she said there were chocolate chips in them, and well I wasn't going to correct her. So now she keeps asking for chocolate cake. I supposed there could be worse things she could be eating.

Ethan the teething toy!

I was gonna let Sara post these on her blog, but you snooze you lose. Aren't these just hilarious. Brody thought Ethan was just one big teething toy.

Elf'ed

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Gotcha!!

Ok, now I'm satisfied. I got the genuine smile I've been after. He was so happy in the bouncy seat.

Videos!!

It's been awhile since I've posted some videos. Here ya go.

Belle can say some of the cutest things sometimes and so we got some of it on tape. Notice the one eye.



Here she was watching some show Nic had found on one of the christian channels. She's trying to imitate the moves the kids are doing. I particularly love the end when she strikes the pose.

Sorry about it being so dark, Nic turned off the light on the camera for some reason.

Free Cat

Beautiful orange striped cat available, six month old female. Must not mind having your feet attacked, constant meowing and paci robbing. You will see no affection nor does she want any. Best to just keep your distance.

Ok, I'm SO a dog person. Or maybe I'm so not a Kiki person. I'm ready to kick her out. If it wasn't for my belief that once you take on a pet it's forever, I'm afraid she'd already be gone.

Last night we had to get her out of Belle's bed while Belle was sleeping because she was trying to steal her pacis. Then once we shut the door so she couldn't get it, she jumped up on the gate and knocked it down, making a huge noise. Then stood outside the door multiple times meowing. At that point I locked her up in the bathroom, only to have to hear her meow all night myself.

I tell ya what, at 3am I'm having murderous thoughts towards the cat. Between two kids getting up, I do not need the cat contributing to it.

Ethan's many faces

I've been trying to catch the illusive smile for awhile. Here is what I got.









"Im SO over this camera business"

My Little Stripper!

So I was feeding Ethan and checking my email when I looked up and found this. I wasn't in a position to put her clothes back on her so I just let her be.



Then I look up again and see this. The good thing is that once she was completely naked I told her to sit on the potty while I finished feeding Ethan, and see peed. =)

Ethan's new girlfriend

Welcome to the world Lyla Mae!!!

My friend Anita had a little girl yesterday. Im excited to hear how everything went and see pictures.

Congrats Anita!!

Went to see the "wishies"

We all headed down to the Newport Aquarium this weekend. Belle loved seeing the "wishies".



Brody enjoying the view






Shortly after this shot, Nic took one for the team and was pooped on by these birds. The things a father does so his daughter can feed the birds. =)

Poor Girl!!

Poor Belle cannot get well it seems like. She came home after I had Ethan with a stomach bug that gave her diarrhea. She was over that for a few days when a mild cough started, and has had that for bout a week. Then last night she was up half the night throwing up only to wake up with more diarrhea.

Can we all just get a break!!!

Awwwww!

Sunday Best

We took Ethan to his first church service. Both kids looked so darn cute.


And just cause they are so darn cute.


More cuteness:
- She calls Ethan "monkey toes". She'll get up on the chair beside the diaper changer and call him monkey toes. Nic was showing Belle his feet one night and called him that and I guess it stuck.

- She loves to hold Ethan. She's always saying "holdy?"

- She's been helping me burp Ethan. She'll come over and pat his back with me.

Hospital Photo

Albeit very small and grainy, here is Ethan's hospital portrait. No more baby mug shots. These people did an excellent job with Belle's pictures and we just had to have a matching one fore Ethan.

Big Sister

Belle came home on sunday and met Ethan. She has wet hair because she had to immediately get a bath. She had thrown up in the car. She spent the next several days sick and feeling kinda crummy.

She loves her new brother. She loves to hold him and give him his bottle. She'll also let us know as soon as he cries.

She said something funny today. While I was changing Ethan's diaper, Belle climbed up on the table and pointed at his umbilical cord. She called it "belly poopy". How funny is that?









His first bath

He's Here!!

Some of you may have already seen my sister's blog and saw some pictures, but here are some more for you.

Ethan Amadeus entered the world at 1:57pm weighing in at 8lbs 5oz and 21 inches long on Thursday Oct. 2nd. He was about 6oz heavier than Belle was. I thought for sure he'd weigh less, going by the ultrasound I had 2 weeks earlier.

I'll post a birth story on this post, but I must say that this experience was MUCH better. Some of you know that I had a horrible tear with Belle and while I still tore this time, it was no where near as bad.

**Warning** Some ooey gooey pictures are included. Don't look if that grosses you out.

Here is me still pregnant. And the proud papa.


I love this picture for some reason. Maybe it's the cute little tushy. Oh and by the way, Ethan did not get a crooked butt crack like Belle. Darn =)


Here is my "what? you want me touch him?" picture. I wasn't expecting them to just throw him on my stomach. With Belle, she had meconium and so they had to wisk her off to the NICU nurses.


Here he is. He looks a lot fuller in these pictures. He's since lost some weight and is down to 7lbs 15oz.



Us getting ready to come home.


Stay tuned for some pictures when Belle gets to meet him tomorrow when my inlaws bring her home.

BIRTH STORY:
7:30 - Nic and I arrive at the hospital for the induction. The nurses were already in the room waiting for me. I got into my gown and worked on getting my IV going.

8:30 - Dr. Davidson came by and broke my water and got my pitocin started. I wasn't expecting them to break my water right off the bat. I was a little scared of the pitocin too cause I had heard some bad things about it. While the Dr. was doing her thing she checked me and I was 4cm 75% effaced.

I just sat back and hung out at this point. The pitocin was doing it's job cause I started getting crampy right away. Nothing too awful though.

10:00 - They were upping my pitocin every half hour or so and things got progressively more painful. Still nothing I didn't think I could handle.

11:00 - Thing are getting a little worse in the pain dept. Enough that I was having to breath through the contractions. I decide that Im not going to be a martyr and ask for the epidural. I figured that I'm going to get one in the end anyways and so why deal with this pain now.

11:45 - The epidural nurse comes in and not a moment too soon. I was really glad I asked for it when I did because the contractions are coming fast and furious at this point.

Once they got the epidural in they checked me and I was at 6cm. It probably took about 45 min to get the epi in once everything got situated and done.

After about 15 minutes the nurses came back cause I was having some break through pain. Nothing horrible, just enough pain that I was feeling it, even with the epidural. That and I was starting to shake uncontrollably. I should've known something was up cause the one nurse looked at the other nurse and just shook her head. They left saying that they were going to get the warmer and call Dr. Davidson.

I pushed my little epidural button since they said it would probably take 30 minutes to take effect. It gave me a little extra dose of medicine to combat the break through pain.

The nurses come back in after calling the Dr. They ask me if I was feeling any pressure, I said no. Not 5 minutes after they leave I do start to feel pressure.

1:00 - They call the Dr back and tell her to head on over. I guess the Dr. had said to just let me "labor down". Well that wasn't needed cause I was ready to push.

So we all just hung out waiting for the dr. to get there. I continued to feel more and more pressure. Sara decides to nurse Brody and send him out with Poppy. About the time the Dr. gets there Brody decides to poop up his back and holds up progress. We had to wait to he got cleaned up so that the Dr. could move in her equipment and we could get started.

1:20 - I start pushing. This time I had just enough epidural that I could feel something, just not pain. We took things a lot slower so that I could "stretch".

1:57 - Ethan was born!! I totally was not expecting them to just throw him up on my stomach. I didn't get to experience that with Belle because she had to be rushed over to the nurses because of the meconium in the water. The nurse actually had to grab my hand and put it on him. While I love my son dearly, I really was just thinking to myself "can't you just clean him first".

He was much bigger than we all thought and I was glad that we didn't wait til he was 40 weeks.

Get out of my belly!!

Here is my final belly shot. Ethan will be evicted next Thurs starting at 7:30. So far I'm 4cm 50% dialated. The dr. said she kinda stretched things out so we'll see if things get moving on their own.

I'm not sure why Belle will not open her dang eyes when we tell her to smile. I hope it's just a phase.