Audrey's Birth

 I was scheduled to be induced on November 9th, but on the the morning of the 7th I woke up to lots of blood.   I thought that my water may have broken so we rushed to the hospital.   The nurse checked me and said I was in labor.  I told them that I usually went fast so they hurried and put in an epidural.  My contractions then slowed down and they decided that I actually wasn't in labor and that my bleeding had been from one of my vulvar varicose veins that had burst (which is very unusual).  But since I already had an epidural and I was scheduled to be induced in 2 days, they decided to break my water.  When that didn't seem to do anything they decided to help my contractions along with some pitocin.  The contractions started hurting like crazy on one side of my body.  I was upset because I was really looking forward to a pain free birth experience.  The nurse had me lay on my side and the epidural started working on the other side too.    I started contracting more often, and then the nurse noticed that Audrey's heart rate was going down with my contractions. When she checked me again she found I was ready to push.  Unfortunately the doctor who had been waiting around all day to deliver Audrey had just gone into surgery so they had me try not to push while another doctor rushed over to deliver her.

 It was nice to be able to push without it hurting.  The doctor had to use a vacuum at the end because he was worried about her heart rate, but then her head came out with the next push.  She was born at 4:36 p.m. When I heard her cry for the first time, I started to cry because I was so happy (with Thomas I didn't hear him cry until he was almost a week old).  I also got to hold her right after birth which was nice since Nathan and Thomas were both whisked away into the NICU.  Of all my birth experiences, this was by far my best.  I could enjoy my sweet baby without all the pain.

 She was upset by the birth experience and peed all over me, but I was so happy that she was healthy that I didn't care.

 It was a good thing she peed because she came in at exactly 7 pounds.  My biggest baby by about a pound.  She measured 19.5  inches, so she is also my longest baby by an inch.

Her face is really swollen here, but you can still tell she is a cutie.

Jared was one proud daddy!

The kids were super excited to meet their little sister!

 Abby holding Audrey for the fist time.

 Maddy is thrilled to have a little sister.

You can tell that Nathan is going to be the best big brother a girl could ask for.

  Mommy enjoying Audrey snuggles.

 A picture of all my girls.

Enjoying snuggles with all my kids (I'm sure Thomas was there in spirit).

 Ready to take my little princess home.

 A picture right before leaving the hospital.  We feel so blessed to have Audrey join our family.  We love her so much already.

October 2014 Update

Halloween Fun

The kids wanted to go to their favorite pumpkin patch in Washington one last time.

They had fun climbing the hay pyramids.

The kids were great navigators because for once we made it through the corn maze by going through the entrance and out the exit and it only took us 30 minutes.

Abby and Nathan had fun on the car driving ride.

Picking out a pumpkin for Audrey from the pumpkin patch.

Nathan holding our final choice.

Nathan was excited to go on the airplane ride.

Abby wanted a red one.

Maddy all ready for take off.

When Nathan had his kindergarten pumpkin patch field trip the girls were feeling left out so we had a homeschool pumpkin patch field trip to our backyard where they went to pick out a pumpkin of their own.

The kids' Halloween wouldn't be complete without dressing up for the Library Halloween parade.  The kids listened to spooky stories, paraded around the library, and then did Halloween crafts.

With Jared down in Texas, the kids were stuck with Mommy for help carving pumpkins.  We decided to carve a teddy bear one for Thomas since he always loved his stuffed animals.

Here are the kids with their pumpkins that they designed themselves.   Abby drew this happy face, Nathan wanted this scary face to frighten the "bad guys," and Maddy, of course, wanted a kitty.

Here are all our pumpkins lit up.  The heart one was for Jared because I was missing him and the little smiling ghost face was for Audrey.

The kids were super excited when Jared flew in Halloween night just in time to take them trick or treating.

The kids really wanted me to dress up too, so here I am as Lady Shadow, the pregnant clandestine operative from Studio C.

Here are the kids sorting candy after trick or treating.  They chose their 10 favorite pieces and are giving the rest to the bishop to use for tithing settlement, etc.

NATHAN

Here is Nathan running in his school's jog a thon.  I was proud of him running so well and not giving up even though he was tired.

He made 33 laps!

Here he is with his class.

Nathan likes Kindergarten but doesn't want to miss out on any homeschool fun.  When Maddy was learning about money and having a store in her room, he decided to have his own store where he sold cars, LEGOs, and weapons.

AUDREY

Audrey is still inside me and seems to be doing well.  She kicks me a lot and the kids think it's fun to watch my tummy jiggle as she moves around.

September 2014 Update

BADGER MOUNTAIN

The kids really wanted to hike Badger Mountain one last time with Daddy before they moved.  They all made it without being carried and were very proud of themselves.

FINAL WASHINGTON VACATION
At the beginning of this month we finally got our house on the market, and left on a trip the next day.   We wanted to take one last family trip before leaving Washington.  I'm glad we left when we did since we had a lot of showings and would have had to be out of the house anyway.  It was nice to have some relaxing family time after all the stress of getting our house ready to sell.

STONEHENGE

No, we did not see the real Stonehenge but we did get to see this life size replica of it.   The funny thing is that we met a couple from England who had seen the real thing, but they thought this one we fun since you could actually get up next to it and it was complete rather than ruins.

 Here are the kids doing their silly picture poses.

APE CAVES

We drove all the way to Ape Caves, which are some giant caves formed by a lava flow millions of years ago.

There were a lot of cool features in the caves.

LAVA TUBES

The kids had fun climbing down the lava tubes formed by a casting process in which trees got caught in a lava flow thousands of years ago.  The trees later rotted away leaving the tubes.

Abby crawling in one of the tubes.

Nathan looking up from a lava tube.

A tube formed from a tree trunk on it's side.

Maddy coming out of the lava tube.

MOUNT ST HELEN'S

Mount St. Helen's in the distance.

Mount St Helen's from the Johnston Ridge Observatory.

Mt St. Helen's up close.

The kids at the Mount St Helen's visitor center.  It was really interesting to learn about the history of the event.  It is crazy to think that is exploded just 2 days after Jared was born.

By the second day our house was on the market we had three offers.  The problem was that we couldn't get cell reception almost anywhere.  Finally we found a look out to Mount St Helen's that had cell reception so we stopped and had a picnic lunch and docu-signed papers on Jared's cell phone to sell our house.

CAMPING

The kids had fun camping and roasting marshmallows for s'mores.

MOUNT RAINIER NATIONAL PARK

On our last day we visited Mount Rainier National park.  We lucked out and had gorgeous weather with a perfect view of the summit.

One of the waterfalls we hiked to.

Beautiful mountain ranges

Mount Rainier  from the base

We hiked a bit at the base and enjoyed seeing all the beautiful meadows with wild flowers.

Maddy of course liked the purple ones the best.

We took another small hike to this beautiful waterfall which was near the base.

SNOQUALMIE FALLS

Since it was our last trip to the west side of the state we decided to make a stop at Snoqualmie Falls on our way home.   We made it there right as the sun set.

Jared with the kids.

Jared looking handsome in his Indiana Jones hat.

Final view of the falls.


HOWARD AMON PARK

Once our house was under contract to sell, Jared had more time to spend with me and the kids.  We visited one of the kids' favorite parks.  Here are the kids at the top of a rock climbing wall there.

THOMAS' 2nd BIRTHDAY

Jared had to go down to Texas for some pre-employment stuff and to find a house to rent, so we didn't have him home for Thomas' birthday.  We celebrated when he got back instead.  This year would have been Thomas' 2nd birthday.  We celebrated by going out to dinner, looking at his save box and pictures, and having cake.  We sure love and miss our sweet little guy.  We are so grateful for the time we had to spend with him.