Milestones

Sofie started Kindergarten this fall!  She barely missed the cutoff for her birthday, and I'm so grateful because she's way too bright to keep in preschool another year!  The morning of the first day she was sooooo excited!  She had stayed up late of course because she couldn't stand the suspense, so that morning was really.....fun.  She wanted to go as soon as she woke up, so getting her to get dressed, eat breakfast, do her hair, etc. was pretty much impossible.  She was beastly.  I was not one of those teary eyed moms, clinging for dear life to their darling 5 year old.  I couldn't get her out soon enough!  Here are a few examples of the range of emotions Sofie graced us with that morning.

Daddy trying to talk her through her emotions.

Mom, "Seriously?  Am I having to deal with this and a newborn, all at the same time?"

Eventually we got a smile.

The next morning, in front of her school.  A lot less anxiety for her.

Another wonderful milestone! 

Meimei's hair is long enough to do piggies!!  Just wish she'd leave them in longer than 5 minutes.

The First Few

*Warning: I think my baby is extremely cute, so there's lots of pictures!

At home at last!!  We came home on Saturday morning and the girls were SOOOO excited to hold Ollie.

He's a very good baby!  Mostly he is happy and sleepy.  He lets me know when he's hungry (which is unfortunately too often, every 2 hours some nights is a bit excessive, especially when it takes nearly an hour to nurse him!!)  Such a change from our cranky baby Meili!

My mom came to help every day for almost 2 weeks.  Sofie started Kindergarten and I needed some extra help getting everybody up and ready to go!

Love it!  (I guess I'll keep the 4 hours of sleep at night in order to hold this cute thing during the day too)

Everyone was sick!  My kids, my parents, my sister's kids, etc.  

Still chunky, but less than he was at birth.

Ollie's first week "birthday"

Real life.

This is Baby Boy snuggled up in his daddy's baby blanket...I need to find a picture of Derek in it too!

The best duh-face EVER!

Daddy's boy

Learnin' to be awake!

The Baby Boy's Birthday!!

Phew!  Only takes a few weeks to blog about a baby I guess!

Here's the short story:

On Wed. August 14, I had a procedure done at the Doctor's office to speed things up a bit...it worked!

By midnight, labor was in full swing, starting with fierce contractions 5 minutes apart.  Fortunately, Derek's brother was staying with us for the week, so we had him stay with the girls while we left for the hospital around 2:30 am.  Most of our time was spent waiting for things to progress while I was numb from the waist down, but once he was ready to come it only took 3 pushes!  Baby Oliver Cole was born at 8:55 am on Thursday.  8 lbs 10 oz and 19 inches long.  He was a chubby chunk!  Having him come almost two weeks early was SUCH a blessing for lots of reasons! (Pregnancy was torture, Sofie starting kindergarten, Sofie having a birthday, Derek's family was in town, etc!)

Here's me walking out the door at 2:30 am, Thursday morning.

(Hurry take the picture before the next contraction!)

Here's Ollie about a week old, thank heavens he's not in there anymore!!

The first few minutes of life.  Sad story apparently!

Daddy got to hold him while my shakes calmed down.

Face fat sag.  So cute!!

My aunt Deena is a nurse at UVRMC, and we were super lucky to have her on duty for another one of our babies.  Ollie's first bath!

Arms are a bit full now!

Meeting his sisters!

Meili was shielding his eyes from the lights.  Protective big sister already!

Derek making the best of his stay in the hospital...good thing we have so much nerdy technology, so Derek could enjoy his Fringe episodes on the worlds most comfy chair-bed!

Ollie's blood sugar was frighteningly low when he was born so they stuffed him full of formula within hours of birth...He slept and didn't have ANY interest in nursing the full first day!  Of course, once the sun went down he was wide awake and ready for the world!

My little dolly.  

So much squish to love!!  Sadly, he lost most of the squish and hasn't quite gained it back yet :(  Now that he's grown a couple inches, I'm afraid he'll never be that squishy again!

Thanksgiving Point

For Derek's summer work party this year we got free passes to all the attractions at Thanksgiving Point here in Lehi.  The girls had never been to the Dinosaur Museum there, so it was really fun.  Afterward we had a carnival/dinner as well.  It was a very full day!

The Tinker room in the Dinosaur Museum was their favorite.

Lots of hands on activities.

Meili loved watching things fly out of the wind tunnel.

Posing on a dino dig.  Meili looks like a scary creature!

The sand and water table, they LOVED it!

Face painting at the party.

Meili was VERY suspicious of the lady painting on her face.

But they turned out stinkin' cute.

Sofie loved the mama cow.

(but the look on Derek's face as the calf was nursing...that was priceless!!)

Our girls love the "Zoo Farm"

Let me out!

Meili was crushed that she didn't get to ride, next time maybe. :(

Mooooo