Rachel turns 3 months

Rachel is such a wonderful addition to our family! Rachel has been up to lots of new things. She is much more aware and alert of her surroundings, she can hold her head up even better now, she is teething like crazy (no teeth yet) so everything is going into her mouth, she loves watching big brother play (especially when JP and daddy are playing), JP makes her smile all the time, she loves looking at her toys and is starting to grab at them, and Paul says she even laughed for the first time (although I didn't get to really hear it). She likes to suck her left thumb to sooth herself. Maybe this means she's a lefty! There's lefties on both sides of the family including me. But one of the biggest accomplishments she did this past month is roll over for the first time! She doesn't do it all the time but she has done it a few times. Here she is trying to roll over...




















She loves her daddy very much. You can see it in the way she looks at him. She just lights up when he's holding her. She loves being in daddy's arms and calms right down when he's holding her.

We are so proud of her and cannot wait to see what this next month will bring. She brings so much joy into our lives. We cannot imagine life without her. Here are some more pic's...

Jeremiah's First Hair(s) Cut

Today Jeremiah went to get his hair cut for the first time. I didn't want JP to get his hair cut because winter is fast approaching and he has thin hair that's short in the front. But Paul kept saying that Jeremiah was starting to look like he was growing a mullet and needed to get a trim. So here we are in front of Jack and Jill Children's Salon ready for JP's first haircut.

Here's a picture of Jeremiah getting introduced to the hair clippers. He was more curious about them than nervous and once the haircut started he didn't pay them much attention but rather watched things progress in the mirror.

Next is a picture of the start of the haircut. You can see the cool blue Mercedes he got to drive.

Next is a closeup of JP during the transformation. You can see the intent look on his face as he tried to figure out why the lady was studying his face so carefully...

Next she's wetting his hair to work on blending and evening out the top.












You can see the look of joy as he makes the 180 degree hairpin turn and floors it down the back stretch...



Cute spiky hair picture I just had to throw in.





Transformation Complete.
No more mullet!!!
Jeremiah's certificate and evidence bag proving he survived. Got to love the mug-shot look he has in the photo.

Rachel is 2 Months Old

Rachel is now 2 months and 2 days old. She is growing and developing really well. We had our two month checkup and first series of immunizations yesterday. Rachel now weighs 10lbs 15oz. (50th percentile), and is 21 1/4" tall (the 15th percentile). Paul did not agree with the length measurement so he decided to measure Rachel himself. He got 21 3/4" tall. So I told Paul to split the difference and say she is 21 1/2" tall.

Anyway, the doctor told us she is on her way to rolling over. He was impressed with how well she can hold up her head and how well she was pushing up her chest while on her tummy. We gave the doctor an update on how Rachel is doing with GIRD and he did not seem concerned. He told us that if she spits us about half an hour after we gave her the medicine to go ahead and give her another dose.

Rachel got three shots and one dose of liquid medicine. She did well with the shots and cried on and off for about two minutes total. We were very happy with how well she handled the shots.














Paul and I decided to take Rachel to get her ears pierced (you have to wait until they are two months old and have received their first series of immunizations). Paul and I picked out her earrings, we got her little round diamond studs. You fill out some paper work, then they mark her ears to let you decide if you like the placement. If you are happy then they go ahead and pierce them. They have to do one at a time with little ones because they do not know how to hold still. The lady was very nice and did an amazing job.

Happy Halloween 2009!

It was Rachel's first Halloween and JP was showing her the ropes. Well that is how to be hot and get upset about it. We did not take the kids out but had a wonderful time handing out candy. If you cannot tell JP was a pirate and Rachel was Princess Bell.

JP did not want to wear his pirate hat. All he wanted was to get into the candy. At one point he got a piece of candy from the dinning room table and was trying to go upstairs with it. We did give him one piece of candy and boy did he love it. He also loved to look out the window and see the kids coming to the door in their costumes. He would get all excited when they would ring the doorbell.








Rachel did well until she got hot and then she wanted nothing to do with the costume and wanted to get undressed.



















The other thing we did was skype with Uncle Scott, Auntie Christine, Cousins Avery & Mia, and Grammy Linda. It was a lot of fun to see the girls all dressed up so cute. We really do miss them a lot. Here is JP getting ready to skype with everyone...Mia was a lady bug and Avery was a bumble bee. They were too cute for words so her is a picture...

Jeremiah is 15 months old

Today JP went for his 15 month checkup and immunizations. He was such a trooper. He did not cry at all when he got his first shot and cried for about 10 seconds with the second one. The nurse had a hard time holding his legs still because he is so strong. She said that she was warned about how strong he is. I held his arms so that he would not reach down and accidentally get stabbed by the needle. Jeremiah is growing extremely well. He weighs 25lbs 2oz. (in the 55th percentile), and is 31 1/4" tall (50th percentile).

He really has changed in this last month. He loves kissing his sister and is now trying to pick her up. He will try to comfort her when she cries and comes to find me when I do not come fast enough for his liking. He is saying a lot of new words now. He says "sister" and goes around looking for Rachel. He says "tutle" (turtle) for his favorite stuffed animal. He has said "Gammy" (Grammy) for his Grammy Linda. Although she has not heard it yet. He says "book" when he wants or is playing with his books.

As most of you know he can climb the coffee table and stairs. He even pushes the chairs to climb to things that are even higher. He loves to climb the couch in the front room and look out the window and watch for daddy coming home from work. He even will look out the window and just watch the snow falling.

He loves to be outside now matter how cold it is. He loves running in the grass, playing with the rocks, going for adventures (walks), riding his tricycle, playing on the swings at the park, climbing anything that he can at the park, and helping daddy with the yard work. Going for jogs with daddy in the jogging stroller (I just got cleared to start exercising so now I can join them on their jogs). Jeremiah loves to climb anything that he can and has no fear, which is good and also bad. We are trying to teach him to have a healthy respect for climbing and heights.

JP is looking forward to the winter snow, playing in the sow, Halloween, Watching his sister get bigger (he wants to play with her), Thanksgiving (with Grammy Linda coming), first Christmas in our house as a family (last year we went to Cali.), growing and learning.

Rachel Has GERD

Rachel has GIRD (Gastrointestinal Reflux Disease). What happens is when she eats and her tummy is full the sphincter at the top of her stomach does not close all the way causing her to spit up all her food. This brings up stomach acid and is painful. Jeremiah had this too at the same age. We took her to the doctor who prescribed her medication to help reduce the amount of acid that her stomach produces.

They wanted me to give her the medicine and then weigh her after two days and let them know if she has lost or gained weight. At the doctor she weighed 9lbs 5oz. and when we weighed her two days later she weighed the same (9lbs 5oz.). We called the doctor and informed him that there was no weight change. He than told us to up the amount of medicine we were giving her to see if that helped. They also wanted us to come in a week later to check on her weight.

So today that is exactly what we did. While we were there for JP's 15 month checkup we also had Rachel looked at and weighed. We got to do a twofer. Anyway, she is doing really well and weighs 10lbs already. She has gained 11oz. in 6 days. Normal amount of weight gain is 1oz./day she is putting on 2oz./day. She will remain on the medication at least until her two month checkup and then she will get checked again. So we got a clean bill of health for Rachel, which is really good news.

Fall is in the air...

It's fall again here in Colorado, the aspen trees are turning and it is a wonderful time to see the leaves changing colors. So we drove about an hour and half to see the beautiful trees and the "aspen gold"!

This year JP was running around and picking up the leaves. He had so much fun picking up the leaves and inspecting them. He wanted to go off exploring and was really sad when we had to leave.

Here are some more pictures from our first adventure as a family of four...