Around Here (aka, Picture Overload)

We've had some exciting news around here lately. The MOST exciting being the birth of our beautiful baby girl, Katherine Grace. We like to call her Kate.

She is an amazing addition to our little family, which seems "not so little" anymore.

The labor and delivery was my hardest, by a stretch (I will remind Kate of this during the tough teenage years). I passed out, bled (a lot, like 3 liters a lot) and the labor and pushing was longer than the others. But it was all worth it in the end. 8 lb 3 oz, 21 inch baby Kate made her entrance into this world at 4:03pm on a cloudy January 23rd. And we can't get enough of her.

Welcome to the world, little cheesy vernix baby.

We all assumed she would have blonde hair and blue eyes like her brothers. But we were surprised with dark hair (a long tuft of it at the crown of her head) and dark blue eyes.

Her brothers love her. A lot.

Andy, waiting to hold her...

I'm loving the pink. and the flowers. and the bows.

Other news headlines include...

Lucas Kimball is potty-trained! He decided about 2 weeks before the arrival of baby Kate that he wanted to wear big boy underwear. And we are all as pleased as punch!

Noah got a "Student of the Month" award at his school in the area of Science/Social Studies

Andy...well, Andy is just as cute as ever...

and Ephraim, oh Ephraim. He is battling a kidney stone for the 9th day in a row. Any suggestions? I feel like we've tried everything...from 2 ER visits, to a CAT scan, to home remedies, to drugs (legal, of course).

But we go on. and our family feels complete. This time for sure.

Ch..Ch..Ch..Changes (and a little Halloween)

We've had a lot of things going on around here lately...most of which seem to involve buying things and moving furniture. We started with getting rid of our "newlywed" table that only seated 4 people. With the 6th arriving in about 2 months, it just wasn't going to work out anymore.

Soooo...here's to the old...

Let's bring on the new...

I love it. It seats several more and is a good use of wasted space. Thanks to Brian Clark at BC Creative for building this!

We're also in the process of transforming the "office" into a baby room. It still has some transforming to go, but it's on its way.

Before...(this is the best pic I could find...which is of the desk and a cute little boy)...

and after... (this baby had better be a girl)

I've been changing a bit. I was hoping that this baby might come out a little smaller than the others (since she's a girl and all), but I seem to be growing just as fast.

And Halloween was great this year, as always. The older boys are really into Star Wars...and Luke, although he wanted to be Yoda, was happy to wear his brother's hand-me-down Indian costume.

My parents came to visit for a week during Halloween and we were able to do lots of fun things (one of them being when my mom made the cushions for the new benches in my kitchen...well, maybe that was just fun for me...thanks so much, mom!)

One. More. Baby.

I briefly mentioned in the last post (which was too long ago) that we are pregnant with our 4th (and final) child. (I always say "we" because I am a bear to live with while I'm pregnant. Ephraim experiences almost as much grief as I do).

We recently had our mid-pregnancy ultrasound...and...we found out we are having a girl!

I am very excited in so many ways. And scared in so many others. But mostly excited. I have always wanted a girl. And I love the fact that she is coming at the end of my wild, energetic, and fun-loving boys. But I'm also nervous about all of the worries, stress and drama that come with raising a little girl. Any suggestions to raising a girl would be greatly appreciated.

I look at these ultrasound pics every day. I love them. And I love her so much already.


I am mostly grateful that our baby looks healthy and is growing like she should. I can't wait to hold her in my arms and see what (and who) she looks like. It almost makes the last 4 months of this pregnancy seem bearable.

And for fun... I found this picture in our archives. Seriously, Andy, what are you thinking? And who took this picture? Oh wait, that was me.

10 years

So we celebrated our 10 year anniversary this week. It was fun to look back and see how far we have come in the last 10 years. We started out so young, although we weren't even THAT young...we were 24 and 27. But we looked young.


Don't you just love the cheese oozing from this next picture... (and why do I look so much happier than Ephraim?)

It was just Eph and I in the beginning but now we have been blessed with 3 amazing boys. And one on the way (one baby, not one boy. Well, maybe one boy...we don't know yet).




How lucky am I?
Thank you, sweetheart, for an amazing 10 years. We've been a lot of places and have experienced many things. And I'm so glad I've been able to do it with you. I can't wait to see what the next 10 years hold (we just commented last night that on our 20th anniversary, we will have 3 teenage boys...oh my)

Ohhhhhh, Andy

Maybe the defect is with his bike. (and before you ask.....yes, he was wearing a helmet)

This kid is the reason for my gray hairs

What we did

Sooooo...this is what we did with all of our fabulous weather last week....











Never mind the fuzzy spot on most of the pictures. Ephraim has now taken over camera duty

Weather

This is really our weather for the next week. I need to be planning some outdoor activities with the kids.

Today
May 21

Partly Cloudy

83°
55°

Sun
May 22

Partly Cloudy

83°
56°

Mon
May 23

Partly Cloudy

78°
55°

Tue
May 24

Mostly Sunny

78°
54°

Wed
May 25

Sunny

83°
60°

Thu
May 26

Mostly Sunny

88°
61°

Fri
May 27

Sunny

88°
62°

Sat
May 28

Mostly Sunny

91°
62°