Life As We Know It...

Life the past 5 days has gone remarkably well and we're all making a pretty smooth transition to being a family of four. With all the extra help my mom's been able to provide and with Lem being home we've been able to keep Sycely on her schedule and she's been getting lots of attention. She's been getting to do some special things with her "Far Nanny" too. They've been enjoying playing outside, going for walks and even took a super fun trip to the zoo.

Ella is getting herself a schedule established and seems to be quite content with life outside the womb. She's a super great sleeper so far, for the most part. We had a couple "off" nights, but it turns out she sleeps just fine if she's laying in bed with her Mommy instead of in her bassinet. Otherwise she's been sleeping some pretty long stretches at night- 5 hours or so without waking. She seems to be pretty excited about this whole milk thing Mommy's got going on and after nursing she's usually pretty conked out for a while. Who wouldn't be...full tummy, all snugly and warm-a nap just makes good sense.

Ella had her first at home bath yesterday. We had to be extra careful of her belly button still, but Mommy, Daddy and Big Sister made for a pretty good bathing team and got the job done. Sycely hasn't too excited to help wash her hair, but she was all about scrubbing her down with a soapy washcloth. Ella was all about getting out of the bath and back into her warm snugly clothes!

Sycely has pretty much mastered the whole Big Sister thing. She seems pretty okay with this baby being a permanent fixture around here. She hasn't told us she's ready for this new baby to "go back to her house" yet. I think all the conversations and preparation activities we did with her really helped reinforce that Baby Ella was going to be a permanent member of our family. Sycely's been great about making sure Daddy doesn't forget Ella's hat and she's quick to let us know anytime Ella makes ANY kind of sound. She's been reading to Ella, tucking her in and kissing her goodnight at bedtime and has taken to "keeping an eye on my baby sister...how 'bout THIS eye?" as she looks at her, head cocked, with her one eye focused on Ella's every move.

I'm feeling absolutely fabulous and can't believe the difference in recovery between the two births. I'm super excited to be allowed to be up and around now and getting back to some of my Mommy duties with Sycely. I feel about 90% and am really trying to remind myself I need to take things a little slow and not overdue it, just because I feel so great. I'm working on getting the rest of the prepping done for Sycely Princess Tea Party for her birthday this weekend. I'm so glad I did so much pre-planning and prepping in the weeks leading up to Ella's arrival so that I have just a few simple baking and decorating tasks left to do before Saturday. We'll keep you all posted on any updates we have to share.

Oh Baby!

Ella Grace has arrived! She officially missed her due date by 12 minutes coming into the world at 12:12am Saturday, July 26th. Weighing in at 7lbs 2oz Ella is a whole pound smaller than her big sister was, and meauring at 20 inches long she's a half inch longer. She just seems so tiny, even compared to how tiny Sycely seemed as a newborn; she definitely has less bulk to her. I guess that's the12 additional pounds I gained with Sycely :) I started having contractions around 9:15pm and we started timing spacing and duration around 9:35. They were about 5 minutes apart and a minute long so around 10 we called the midwives. We were on the road headed to the Midwifery in Wasilla by 10:30. The ride out was definitely less comfortable this time than with Sycely as my contractions were alot more intense by the time we were driving out. We arrived at the birth center around 11:2o. When we got there I was at 8cm and expecting I had a couple hours yet, started to get myself settled in to labor in the shower and tub, but after only 2 contractions in the shower Ella was ready and it was time to push so I got into the tub and about 10 minutes later Ella entered the world, much like her sister, in a big tub of warm water, caught by her daddy, smelly candles, dim lighting and the sound of ocean waves filling the room. It was very similar (though even faster!) than Sycely's birth and we're so grateful and blessed that both of our girls have had peaceful, natural, tranquil entrances into the world surrounded by joy and prayer. We're so very thankful for our midwives and can't imagine a more splendid birth experience for our girls. Because of my history of "shocky fainting" the midwives were keeping a close eye on my bleeding and such so we stayed at the midwifery until around 1:00pm Saturday. Fortunately, with no tearing this time, I'm facing a much easier recovery despite the super fast delivery, which I am stoked about! Nanny and Papa spent the night Friday night with Sycely and they came out Saturday morning so that Sycely could meet her baby sister. She brought out the elephants she made at build-a-bear and wished Ella a "happy birth-day!" So far she's been pretty enamored with her baby sister. We got about 50 rounds of "Look! She's so tiny!" and she told me last night, "Baby Ella is the best baby sister ever!" (as if she's got grounds for comparison or something) Sycely keeps asking us, "Isn't she adorable?" and is pretty attentive to her needs responding immediately is she hears Ella fuss at all. She's being pretty helpful and is in high spirits and has been enjoying time playing with her Far Nanny and Papa Scott who arrived late Saturday night. We will continue to post more updates and pictures as we rest up and continue to adjust to being a family of four !

Belly Art

One of midwives, Christine, came to do an appointment with us last night. She did a little tummy art for us. She's uses special crayons to trace the baby's body parts, then uses shading and fills in the placenta, umbilical cord and amniotic fluid to show how your baby is positioned. Ella has dropped so much you can just barely see a tiny part of her little profile since her head is down so low, but the rest of her tiny little self is all there. Christine's pretty amazing and it's a pretty neat thing so I thought I'd share some pics.

The Countdown Continues...

We set up the "home studio" this week and tried to get some good photos of our growing family. Everyone's been requesting tummy pictures of how big Baby Ella has gotten (still much smaller than Sycely ever did!) so here they are! Sycely wasn't too hip on posing, she was more into playing around in the curtains and backdrops than anything, but we figure we'll have lots of chances to capture her and her little sister once Ella's actually born. Things are moving right along around here. The house is ready, Baby Ella is DEFINITELY ready, indicating she's got plans to get here a little early, based on the progress discovered at our appointment last week and I've spent the last 5 days trying to lay as low and be as still as possible to try and hold her off until the weekend so that Lem can finish up teaching summer school this week. Once he's all wrapped up with that it shouldn't take much to bring her along-a little walk, mopping the floors, that sort of thing will most likely do the trick. We will be sure to keep everyone posted and will email and post details and pictures as soon as Ella arrives.

Ella-Phant Fun

We took Sycley down to our local Build-A-Bear shop this weekend. We thought it'd be fun for her to pick out and make some matching stuffed animals for her and Ella, plus, Mommy had a coupon! :) We had talked about what kind of animal she wanted to choose and she was pretty set on elephants. When we got there she had a brief moment of relapse and wanted to do bears for a minute or two, but eventually went back to her original choice, the elephants. So she picked them out and set about the process of filling them with fluff and love. She had lost of fun going through the whole process, and even was brave enough to stand on the pedal that makes the fluff shoot in this go round-progress over our last Build-A-Bear visit in Arizona. She knew just what to do picking out hearts to put inside the elephants and followed every step of the "ceremony" the store employee led her through-rubbing the heart on her nose, cheeks, neck, shoulders, etc then eventually giving each one a kiss and tucking it inside. The elephants got closed up then she gave them the traditional air bath and was super meticulous to screub behind their big floppy ears :) She helped me use the computer to fill our their birth certificates-we named Ella's Ella-Phant (hee hee!) After we finished up with that adventure we had lunch at one of our favorite places-Arctic Roadrunner, and of course, wouldn't you know, BOTH elephants just HAD to join us for fries and milkshakes. Mommy made the elephants matching shirts that say Big Sister and Baby Sister (hopefully we'll be able to keep them straight for a while that way-maybe).

All picked out and ready to stuff...

Stuff and Fluff...

Picking out hearts for the elephants

The Heart Ceremony...

Tucking the hearts in our elephants...

All done

Bathtime for the elephants...

Filling out the birth certificates

Having lunch with our new elephants (and demonstrating how to "call their Mother...Ba-Roo!")

Striking a post with Daddy

As Time Goes By...

Sycely and I headed out for our annual daisy photos this week. This being our third year of this endeavor, we're shaping up to be rather seasoned professionals at it-well, she's pretty professional about smelling and picking the flowers, anyway. She had even more fun this year than last year and let her Mommy get a FEW decent snapshots. It's pretty amazing to see how pronounced all her growth and changes are when we compare the pictures from all three years. Praise God we got finally got some sunshine to help us enjoy the adventure!

2006

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2008