Karissa is 5!

The look on Karissa's face here about sums up her excitement for her 5th birthday. Even having it 5 days after Christmas, which I would think would take some of the excitement out of it, she still counted down the days and was well aware of what comes up right after the biggest holiday of the year. Luckily for Karissa, Daddy will always have off work on her birthday and the kids will never have school, so we always get to spend the day together. This year, she wanted to play Glo Golf at the Zap Zone. She had a great time, even though she doesn't quite have the right hold on her golf club. Austin enjoyed it too, though he mostly moved the ball with his hand. They all liked the decor, which all glowed in the dark, though you can't tell in the picture.

Other than talking to family and opening presents and cards from them, all of which she enjoyed, the next big highlight of the day was watching Tangled as a family, which we got from Netflix just in time for her special day.

Karissa got this necklace from us that holds little "gems" in it. Each color represents a different virtue: patience, love, kindness, truth, and charity. She also got a zebra pillow pet from us. Zebras are her favorite animal. She also likes ponies and unicorns. She loves to pretend. In fact, it sometimes gets in the way with reality, but I'm glad she's got such a good imagination. Lately, her favorite thing to "play" is "The Lost Girl". She wanders in and pretends she was lost, then found in a river or some other dramatic location.

She still loves to sing and dance and play with little toys. A new found love has been a computer preschool website with games she enjoys playing. She has always enjoyed drawing, but lately she wants to make books and enjoys having me spell words for her pages, or writing them myself, then putting it together. I think she'll be ready for Kindergarten in the fall.

Happy Birthday Karissa! Stay tuned for her pony party in two weeks!

Oh, and Happy New Year!

Keeping It Simple

For Erik's first Christmas, we decided to keep it simple. He was my favorite stocking stuffer.

On Christmas Eve, Jason made the traditional Puerto Rican dinner of arroz con gandules, pasteles, pork, and even pina coladas. He prepped the pasteles (similar to tamales, but with plantains as a base instead of corn) the weekend before. So he didn't have to spend hours on Christmas Eve cooking. We relaxed and played, the girls and Jason sang carols at a nursing home with friends of ours, and we did the Nativity via skype with Grandma Pat and Grandpa Jim, who are serving their mission in Switzerland. (We were so consumed with talking to Grandma and Grandpa that we forgot to take pictures, but Erik made a good baby Jesus.)
After reading a few stories by the fire with the kids' new pjs on, it was off to bed.
Almost everything had already been wrapped, so there wasn't much rushing around after the kids were in bed.

Victoria's and Karissa's favorite gifts were their American Girl dolls. They haven't parted with them since opening them, even for church yesterday.
Austin got Lightning McQueen from Santa, though he was a little grumpy and getting over a cold, so nothing about Christmas really thrilled him.
He did let me take his picture with his baby brother in their Sunday best, though. My boys!
With previously made and frozen cinnamon rolls for breakfast and previously made dinner rolls, a ham, mashed potatoes, and veggies, it was a fairly simple dinner. I was tired from being woken up early, but I still got pictures of Erik in all his Christmas outfits.
Merry Christmas!

Holiday Happenings

On Saturday our ward had a "Back to Bethlehem" party for the Christmas celebration. The kids looked cute in their biblical attire and enjoyed the more spiritual celebration of Christmas.




I attempted to take stocking pictures of Erik, but the stocking was too big to see to whole thing in a close-up picture, but this shot sure is cute anyway!

Here is Victoria at her first piano recital. She did very well!

http://youtu.be/Llcjs-xulvk

To the Rescue!

Two days after Gramms left, just as we were starting to make progress sleeping for longer periods of time through the night, Erik came down with a small cold. It was nothing big, but for a newborn, any bit of stuffiness is scary and it definitely put us back on our sleeping progress at night. He couldn't breathe very well and so had to wake many times. Luckily, Grandma MaryLou had decided about a week earlier to brave the Michigan December weather and come out to help. By the time she got here, I really needed it again, being sleep deprived. The kids are enjoying having her here and so am I! Erik is doing better now and it finally showed last night. It's a good thing he's gaining weight well, I think it helped him fight that cold! Here is before his first real bath.

And look at these cuties!

11 Days

Erik has reached many milestones the past 11 days; okay, not really. But he did sleep better last night! Victoria helped Gramms make turkey noodle soup. Gramms was very helpful. We miss her!

Daddy got to hold Erik at home, finally. The kids hold him more than he does because they're home more!
Austin says he doesn't want to share his trains with Erik, that's probably true.

Erik is looking at Karissa's cheesy grin, which I didn't catch on camera.
Some more cheese...
Erik is in the middle of a sneeze here.
What an angel!

Erik Andrew

Erik came into this world on his own time. He didn't think the 22nd was a good day, like I did. I went in at 9 am, as scheduled, and was hooked up to pitocin (as well as penicillin since I was positive for Group B Strep) around 10. The good thing about this labor, even though I was in the hospital way too long before actually giving birth, was that the pitocin didn't really cause any painful contractions for the 12 plus hours I was on it. For some reason, it just didn't work its wonders this time. I had some consistent contractions toward the end that started to be uncomfortable, but nothing too bad. The doctor couldn't break my water, which is what I usually need to get things moving, because Erik's head was not engaged in the birth canal. I decided by 10 pm, that when they checked me the next time (which was close to 11) if they couldn't break my water, then I would just go home. Well, lucky us, his head was finally engaged and they could break it. I was at a 3.

The worst part about this labor was that I wasn't able to eat more than broth and jello all day, so by 11 when things started going, I was weak and exhausted. As usual for my labors, I got nauseous soon after the contractions started getting harder. During Austin's birth the Zofran helped and I could concentrate on getting through the contractions, but not this time! The Zofran didn't work very well, so I got to deal with all the vomiting as well. After a couple hours I started shaking like crazy, which I don't usually do until after the baby is born. It made for another interesting detail in the whole L&D. Looking back, the actual active labor part was only about 5 hours, which technically would be my shortest labor, but it was definitely the hardest! Things felt like they were moving slow in this process and I almost couldn't do it without the epidural, but I knew I was getting somewhere and that if I got the epidural, it would only make it longer. Eventually, I got to push, which was also the hardest ever. I had a "lip" at a 9, so the doctors had to push that aside for a couple of pushes. At this time I was on oxygen because the baby's heart rate was going down. I only had to push 5 or 6 times, which is more than I usually do, but still not very much, though it felt like the hardest thing in the world! I was so tired and I wasn't sitting up enough. Then they freaked me out by saying I had to push him out now or they would have to get the vacuum because he wasn't coming fast enough. That must have done it for me. I used every last bit of strength I had to push that 8 pound 4 oz. baby out who was 22 inches long! No wonder he was so hard to get out! I honestly don't know where he went in my belly. He didn't seem much bigger than Austin and he moved around so much like he had all the space in the world! We are so grateful to have him here and part of our family. It made for a very special Thanksgiving.

He doesn't look like Austin at all. He looks the most like Victoria when she was a baby.



I love this turkey bum!

Victoria wants to hold him every second she can. Who can blame her?
Karissa wanted to share her bears with him.
We were so lucky to have Gramms and Abuelo here to help with the kids. Abuelo had to go back already, but we're glad he was here and are grateful for all the work he did. Gramms gets to stay another week, which will save me. She has done a ton so far. Thanks Gramms!

The Date is Set!

Again, I got to call to schedule an induction for baby number 4. I go in November 22 at 9 am to get things going so we can finally meet this little guy. Thanks to Thanksgiving, he will only be 6 days late!

Everything is ready: bag is packed, bassinet is set up, the leaves are almost all picked up from the yard (thanks to Jason's parents for their help), the Christmas tree is up, and all but one Christmas present have been purchased. Yes, I have done some major nesting the past few weeks. I even cleaned that carpets last week! I hear four kids will keep me really busy, so I wanted to do as much as I could before I got there. My neighbor said I was going to put myself into labor with all that work, but I knew better! Here's to a smooth labor and delivery!