Lucas Joseph

He is finally here!!! He was born early Monday morning (2:17 a.m.), February 9th and he weighed 7 lbs. 12 oz. and was 20 inches long. Lucas was stubborn and did not want to show us his beautiful face before or by his due date, which was on February 5th. My doc scheduled an inducement for Sunday night. By 9:30 p.m. they started the pitocin. Since I was doing this overnight they were starting me slowly and expected the actual birth to happen mid-morning on Monday. When I went in I was dialated to a full 3 and having contractions every 30 minutes, so I was ready to go. With the pitocin they gave me ambien to help me sleep. It knocked me out immediately! When I woke up around one in the morning my water broke, and the contractions got pretty intense. I asked for my epidural and the doctor showed up immediately. The drugs kicked in just in time for me to give birth. I pushed through two contractions and Luke was put onto my tummy so I could hold him. It was the easiest birth that I have had! I was so nervous, but I feel so blessed to have had such a great experience.
Here Luke is just minutes old laying close to his mommy!
This is way later that morning with our new little one. What a sweet baby he is.

Grandma Libby brought the big boys by. Their pre-school gave them big brother t-shirts which was a wonderful surprise. The boys were so excited to meet their new brother. It was so sweet. Libby took them to the store to pick out gifts for each of them to bring. They ran down the hallway when they saw Michael. I could hear Trevor yelling "Daddy" and as soon as he got to the door he said, "Look what I got for baby Yuke." That's what he calls him "baby Yuke." Too cute. Caleb was just overwhelmed with happiness. He couldn't wait to hold him and give him a kiss.

We are so blessed and happy to have this new little miracle in our lives. He is so sweet and loveable. I will post more when I have a chance!

Our Christmas

Our Christmas was busy, but we felt very blessed. Although I was determined to be in our own home on Christmas day, we did not meet that deadline. I can't complain though. My very hard-working husband has been working non-stop to prepare our home to be move in ready. He has spent many sleepless nights and weekends trying to make our house perfect.

Christmas Eve was spent at the Meierhofer's. We always eat together, exchange gifts, and try to play a game before the kiddos have a melt down. This year Libby suggested the kids start opening gifts early to spread out the fun. Below, Caleb is playing with one of his gifts he opened early...a cars art set from Aunt Sarah.

Trevor received a singing puppy from Aunt Sarah, which you can tell he LOVES! He is dancing along to the music.

Trevor and cousin Elizabeth are both checking out their singing animals. We can't wait until Aunt Sarah has her own children for us to buy such sweet (loud) gifts for! :)

The four oldest kids eating their dinner. They are all growing up way too fast. Little Lydia will be sitting at the table with them next year.

Grandpa and Trevor taking a break to horse around.

Caleb was so much more patient this year with opening his gifts. He was much more appreciative as well. He loved everything he got.

Trevor really enjoyed opening gifts this year.

The boys and their sweet cousins.

We all went outside after opening gifts to spread the "reigndeer food."

Uncle Adam having a serious chat with Trevor.

Making cookies for Santa

Christmas morning.......Santa brought the boys just what they asked for. A puppy! Caleb was so excited, he had pure joy just pouring out of him.

Dash is our puppy's name (after the really fast boy in the movie "The Incredibles"). Dash is smart and fun, and the boys love him.

Daddy and the boys enjoying Christmas morning.

After the excitment of a new puppy and opening a few gifts from Mommy and Daddy, we headed out to my grandmother's house in East Texas. The boys love playing with their Uncle Dustin.

My Grandma and my Mom.

After eating lunch at my Grandma's and hanging out with Dustin and Misty we headed to our new house to check out the new floors and paint. The boys love the new house. Eventually, we will quit calling it the "new house," but since we haven't settled in yet I guess that is what we will call it.

Here, Michael is showing his parents what all he has done. New sheet rock, new paint on the walls, new paint on the cabinets, and new floors installed. Lots of progress!

We headed back to Mike and Libby's and finally made our gingerbread house that I was determined to make by Christmas!

What's more fun than making a house out of candy, icing, and cookies?

Caleb did most of the work, and he was proud of what a great job he did!

Since Christmas, Michael and I celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary on the first of January. It was very laid back, but wonderful to spend some down time with my hubby. We are now living in our house, but still slowly moving in. The storage building is still pretty full, but Michael is determined to have a place for everything and not clutter this house. I want to get it over with, but it is hard for me to say much since I am doing the least of the work. I am organizing things as he brings plastic bins home. The baby's room is about halfway done as well as the boys' room.

Last Wednesday I went to the doctor to find out I am dialated to a two and that I could last another month, or go into labor any day now. My doctor offered to induce me, but I think I will take all the time I can get to prepare for his arrival. This has been a good pregnancy, so I don't want to rush his birth. I had another check up today, and there is no change. Hopefully he will hold out a few more weeks. I am anxious to meet him and hold him for the first time. His heart rate today was 156 beats per minute and my weight gain is a whopping 31 pounds. I better lay off the sweets!

We hope everyone had a very blessed Christmas and New Year.

First stitches!

Last Friday evening right before Michael got home Caleb was coloring and cutting paper and decided to put a piece of paper on his mouth and act like he was going to cut it. Instead of cutting the paper he cut his lip BADLY! Michael pulled up in his truck right as it happened. I was holding a paper towel over his lip to try to stop it from bleeding and yelled at Michael to come inside. He continued to unload his truck and I yelled again more frantically. He ran inside and started holding the towel for me. Caleb was bleeding everywhere! Caleb was crying and Michael and I were both in shock from seeing all of our little boy's blood. We decided he probably needed stitches, so I started to get Trevor's jacket, and by that time Michael had already left. He said he didn't even think about it, he just knew Caleb needed help. I didn't mind because Trevor would not have liked sitting in the waiting room and I really didn't want to see Caleb get stitches. Caleb only had to get one stitch. The doctor said it was a good thing we brought him in because he cut his lip in a place where it probably would've grown back in a weird way if we hadn't. Caleb even got to go out for ice cream with Daddy after he was all done! Check out all the blood on Caleb's shirt... Caleb had blood all over his face too.
Michael took the stitch out last night. Caleb wimpered a little, but was a big boy overall. Notice how serious Michael is with his head light!

Right before he snipped it...

He got it out pretty easily, and Caleb's lip has healed quite nicely.

Also, I wanted to mention that these were the blunted edged kid scissors. I never thought they would do that much damage. I mean Caleb has been using scissors for 2 years or so! I'm so glad he is okay.

31 weeks

I took this picture one week ago today! So, now I only have 8 weeks to go. I had my final sonogram yesterday. The baby looks like he has NO room, but he still has a way to go. Everything looks healthy. His heart rate was 145 beat per minute and he weighs approximately 3 pounds 3 ounces. I have gained 26 pounds so far...I really wish I was one of those people who could only gain 15 or 20 pounds, but I crave sweets and carbs constantly!! We are soooo excited to welcome baby Luke into this world. I know he will be here before we know it. By the way, I got the wonderful news today that my brother and his wife are having a healthy baby boy!! We are excited for his arrival in May.

Dinner with Santa

Last Tuesday we enjoyed dinner with Santa at El Chico. The boys got a picture with Santa, ate yummy Mexican food, got their faces painted, and had balloons made for them (Caleb got a candy cane and Trevor got a snowman). The boys both told Santa they want a puppy for Christmas (not too sure about this one)!

Grandma and Grandpa went along for the food and fun!

Caleb and Trevor back at home later in front of the Christmas tree.

Caleb loved his snowman. He was so worried it would wash off when he brushed his teeth. He was so sad when he had to take a bath the next day!

A week to be thankful for

We had a great Thanksgiving week!

I had to work on Monday and part of the day on Tuesday, so the boys got to spend a lot of time with Grandma Libby since they didn't have school. She took them to the park to ride bikes and to get out some of their energy. They love spending time with their grandparents, so it was a blast for them to spend this time with her.

Caleb and Trevor both have great imaginations. We had a random empty box, so they would each take turns being the dog while the other threw food to the dog in the box. Trevor was first and Caleb fed him hot dogs.

Caleb was whining for his food.

We got to break out the winter jammies on one of our cold nights.


BIG news....we closed on our house!! Tuesday, November 25th we signed a ton of papers, wrote a large check, and ate dinner to celebrate. We drove over to the house, hung out for awhile, then stayed the night on a pile of blankets. It wasn't the best sleep I've ever had, especially being 30 weeks pregnant, but we felt we had to! Caleb took the picture of Michael and I below....we were tired, but super happy. Michael even carried me across the threshold.

Caleb was sooooo excited about his new house!



The boys enjoyed playing soccer inside the empty living area.




I took some "before" pictures because Michael has already started demolishing the things we didn't like. Below is the wet bar that we felt was wasted space for us. Michael already tore this whole area down. Now, we just have to figure out what to do with the plumbing that is still standing in it's place.

This is our second living area. Notice the wall closer to the ceiling. It was cedar wood diagonally placed on the wall. Michael ripped all of this down to make room for the sheet rock we are going to put in it's place. The wall of cabinets we are going to paint a creamy color to brighten the room.

This is going to be Caleb and Trevor's room. Of course, we plan to paint and take the princess ceiling fan down. When Caleb first saw it, he said, "Yuck, look at all this girl stuff."

Caleb is such a helpful big brother. Sometimes too helpful, and Trevor yells at him and says, "I can do it myself!" When Trevor asked for help with his jammies, Caleb naturally offered his assistance.

I really wanted to do the Dallas YMCA turkey trot this year, so Michael reluctantly agreed. It is not his ideal relaxing holiday experience, but he wanted to do it for me. The boys were both excited, so we got up early Thankgiving day and headed to Dallas to walk our 3 miles. After walking about 1/2 a mile to get to the actual race, we started almost immediately. I knew this was going to be a big event, but I was not prepared for the crowd! After 10 minutes of barely moving (and starting to feel very claustrophobic) we saw an opportunity to escape and we took it! It was a little disappointing, but I got over it after we walked the other 1/2 mile back to the car.

These are our family pics. on our way to the race.

The boys running to get to the race on time.

Making our way to the start.

After we left Dallas, we headed to east Texas to my grandma's house. She always makes a yummy Thanksgiving feast. We all ate too much, but got to enjoy time together before coming back home.

Here is Trevor getting tickled by Daddy.

Uncle Dustin took care of tickling Caleb.

We drove back to Irving to the Meierhofer Thanksgiving. I cooked a yummy apple pie, sweet potato casserole, and a small ham. Libby cooked a turkey, stuffing, mash potatoes, gravy, and some pies. Amy brought pumpkin pecan pie and green bean casserole. We had way more food than any of us could eat, but it was great. We spent the evening hanging out and going to bed early.

Michael wanted to get a lot done at the house over the weekend since he doesn't get a lot of free time to do stuff like that, so we spent most of our time after Thanksgiving over there. My mom and I did the crazy Black Friday morning shopping. We started at Kohl's at 4:00 in the morning and ended at Home Depot by 8:00. I was exhausted, but got lots of good gifts!

While Daddy worked at the new house, Caleb got to eat lunch on the fire place due to our lack of seating.

You can see all the cedar wood laying on the floor in front of Caleb. Michael also pulled up the carpet in the living areas and hallway so we can put down hardwood floors in a few weeks.

We could barely keep Trevor off of the ladder. He also loved wearing Daddy's flashlight on his head.

Michael is making progress!!

The boys have already spent many hours in our new back yard. They raked leaves and jumped in them, picked up sticks, played in the new big shed. It is one of my favorite parts of the house.

I took the boys back to Grandma and Grandpa's so Michael could get some work done without distractions. Caleb couldn't wait to help Grandma decorate the tree. He loved using the ladder and getting to choose where to put the decorations.

We are definitely thankful for all of our blessings. Mostly for God and His love, but also for our wonderful family and friends. I asked Caleb what he is thankful for and he said toys, food, and his family. Trevor said he is thankful for mommy, daddy, and Caleb. I am so thankful for my kids, they have brought such joy to my life and the lives of those around them. My husband is amazing. He is kind and generous, hard-working and loving. I am thankful my mom is trying to change her life, and only hope that she can be successful with this try at her recovery. I am thankful for the chance to stay home with my boys when little Luke arrives. So much to be thankful for...

We hope to move into our house soon after we finish the renovations, paint all the rooms, and install the new flooring. I would really like to spend Christmas in the house, but don't want to pressure my hubby too much.

We hope everyone has something to be thankful for and can remeber what matters most. It seems I have heard many sermons on what matters most, and that monetary gain and material things are temporary, and what we need to focus on is our relationship with God and spreading His word and His love throughout the world. My prayer is that we all can remember that.