paisley grace schipper

On Sunday morning at 7:29am my sister Jacinda and brother in law Clint welcomed their sweet baby girl into this world. Paisley Grace Schipper.

We were able to go see them at the hospital on Sunday night as a family and then I spent a few hours at the hospital yesterday morning while my mom stayed with my kiddos.

She is just a doll - so much dark hair, her mommy's nose and dimples, and daddy's dark skin.

Babies are such blessings. Every time a child is born it truly is a miracle and we are so thrilled that she arrived safely and healthy - both her and mama!

I can't wait for my sister to experience motherhood and I'm incredibly thankful that we live so close that we will be here to watch little Paisley grow.

We love you Paisley Grace and we look forward to all the fun memories ahead!

more space

Turns out I'm at my maximum storage capacity on this blog and can't add any more pictures until I do something about it.

Looks like I'll be making a book out of my blog posts sooner than I planned. Until then, enjoy my posts with no pictures :)

Any tips on making a blog book from anyone that's done it before?

a house full

This Thanksgiving was a bit unconventional for our family as my sister was due to have her first baby any day which meant she couldn't travel. So we hosted Thanksgiving at our new home and it was a house full. A house full of 6 little ones 6 and under equals lots if playing, laughter, some fights :), lots of food, football, wii playing, movies, and most importantly lots of love! Our house was definitely full as there were 16 of us total and I'll admit I got a little sick of cooking and washing dishes! but as soon as everyone left I immediately missed the chaos!

The fun began on Wednesday when my sister, brother in law, and 2 nephews rolled into town about 5am after driving from Denver, CO through the night. After a little sleeping and breakfast we headed out to enjoy one of the last days of warm weather for awhile at our neighborhood park. We stayed until around lunch time then headed home for lunch and naps. After naps we loaded up and hit the road to spend the next day at my parents and the Grover's. Wednesday night was spent at my parents with the Davis clan and then Thursday morning we headed over to the Grover's for the day.

Thursday we enjoyed a yummy Thanksgiving meal with Jimmy's family at his grandparents and then enjoyed a movie night at the Grover's with his siblings. Then Friday morning it was back to our place to meet up with the Davis clan again.

Friday we spent the afternoon playing games, playing with toys, playing the wii, and just enjoy eachother's company. Us ladies may have done just a little shopping too! We do Black Friday shopping in the middle of the night/early morning every year. However, with my sister being so pregnant and several stores opening Thanksgiving night, which we chose not to support, we ended up hitting up just a few stores later in the afternoon and guess what, we still got almost everything we were after! Friday night we broke in our mini bar, aka snack and popcorn station, and the basement with a family movie.

Then Saturday was a day of decorating sugar cookies for Christmas, more playing for the kiddos, and then everyone hitting the road after lunch. Saturday also became very exciting as my sister started having contractions just hours after everyone left. While we were so excited my sister from Denver was of course so bummed that she missed meeting her niece by just a few hours! 

So the rest of Saturday Jimmy and I took a much needed nap with the kiddos, did some cleaning, and he made a little more progress on his garage organization project before we had to hit the road yet again for another Grover Thanksgiving back North!

Sunday morning we joined the other side of the Grover family for a combined Thanksgiving and Christmas lunch and afternoon that they do every year. However, we cut the trip short as we had a new niece to hurry back and meet! Which that deserves it's own post so that will be next!

Overall things went so well and we enjoyed having everyone at our house so much. Yes it's a lot of work but it's incredibly worth it and we are just so thankful for the time we have together as a family! As our families grow it gets harder and harder to see eachother throughout the year so the holidays are always extra special when we are all together! 

Pictures to come....I'm having issues load them for some reason.

2 months old

Preston turned 2 months old on Monday, November 12th. While it seems like it's gone so fast, he seems like he's been a part of our family for much longer.

Yesterday Preston saw the doctor for his 2 month check up. He now weighs 14lbs 6 oz and is 24 inches long. He is growing like a weed! In the past 2-3 weeks he has really filled out and has turned into one of those chubby babies we all adore!

He is a very good eater although we've been doing mostly bottle feeding him with my pumped breast milk. For some reason he seems to eat better this way, seems to have less gas and just seems more content. This has also been much easier for me as we've transitioned to two and moved - the ability for others to feed him has been a God send! I'm not one that totally loves the breast feeding experience so I am ok with this too. However, I absolutely think breast milk is the best thing for baby, if you can provide it, so I'm just thankful that's what he's getting!

He is a happy baby that just enjoys attention, eating, and lots of love! He eats every 3-4 hours during the day and is still inconsistent with napping but he naps a long nap in both the morning and afternoon/early evening time. He usually goes to bed for the night between 9 and 10pm, sleeps until 3 or 4am, wakes up again at 6am and most days goes back to bed until 8:30am or so. However, the past few days he hasn't been wanting to go back to sleep after his 6am feeding - boo for mama!

He is wearing mostly 0-3 month and 3 month clothes but I think it's time to move him up!

He's been through the stress and dismay of us moving to a new home and weathered it just fine - he doesn't know the difference, right?!

We are going to switch him to cloth diapers in the next few days as well as move him into his crib - he's been sleeping in a pack n play in our room since he came home from the hospital. Lots of change in store my little man!

He smiles and is beginning to coo - I LOVE when they find their little voice! He has discovered his arms and legs and his little right arm just moves around all day long. His little face just lights up when you simply look at him - so sweet! I adore this little baby stage and love the times I do get to just sit and hold him - he is precious!

James Preston,
You are such a happy and easy baby and we simply adore you! You have been such a fun addition to our family and we look forward to a life full of happiness with you! Your little smile and coos make my day and I already can't imagine our family without you! You are a special boy and will always be your mama's little man!
We love you!

Now bring on the chub....:)

a year and a half

November 10th marked Lily's 18th month of life and we are so thankful for every one of those days. Not every day has been easy but still we are thankful and can't imagine our life without our sweet little girl. She has grown into such a little person full of personality and life and I can't help but just smile when I think about our Lily May.

She had her 18 month check up today and weighed in at 26 lbs with a height of 34 inches. That puts her about 90% for both categories. 

She has changed so much in the past few months, saying so many words, is a great big sister to brother Preston - always helping me when I ask her to, running and climbing everywhere and on everything! and loves so many different things. 

Some of her favorite things to play with currently are books, baby dolls, and blocks. She loves Elmo and Curious George and unfortunately has been able to watch a little too much of them lately as we get settled in to our new house :) Her favorite foods still seems to be most all fruits, hot dog, pizza, and fruit snacks. She loves being outside - whether it's riding a 4 wheeler with daddy (or grandma!), playing at the playground, or helping daddy in the garage - she just loves it!

She has so many new words since she was 12 months and has begun putting together 2-3 word sentences. She repeats almost any word you say if you ask her to - which means we better be paying attention to what we say!:) but still gets frustrated sometimes because we don't always understand what she wants or needs.

She is wearing 18-24 month and 2T clothes, takes one afternoon nap a day that is usually 1-2 hours long, she goes to bed between 8 and 8:30pm and usually sleep until 8 or 8:30am, and has begun showing interest in potty training - even going in the potty at least once a day for the past few weeks! Potty training is one of our next big to-do's!

Other new things since my 12 month post - we have moved to Ankeny and she seems to know that this is her new house already, she trick or treated for the first time (dressed as an owl), became a big sister to baby brother Preston, had her first sleep over with Grandma Davis and Grandma Grover at our house while we were in the hospital, went camping, went to her Great Grandma Davis' 80th birthday party, and so many more things I'm sure I'm forgetting to mention!

Lily May,
You are such a wonderful, happy, content, and playful little girl that truly lights up our world. Your funny personality and full of life character bring smiles to mommy and daddy's face every single day. You are a good listener, a terrific big sister, and it's so apparent you love life already! You really do bring us so much joy and we can't imagine life without you! Happy 18 month birthday our sweet baby girl that is growing up way too fast! We love you!

And here's some photos from the last 6 months......

June 2012 - eating sweet corn

Juky 2012 - aunt Jena got married and Lily was the flower girl

August 2012 - trip to the state fair. Also this month she got your first power wheels - a hand me down Barbie Jeep,  and had her first hair cut!

October 2012 - trick or treat, our little owl

September 2012 - Lily became a big sister! She also enjoyed time in the tractor and combine with Grandpa Grover and daddy!

adjusting

Well we have officially moved and are now residents of Ankeny. We spent last weekend guiding the movers on Friday and unpacking boxes with the help of my parents and my sister and brother in law the rest of the weekend. We had a nice break from the paper and boxes and had a dinner party at Jimmy's bosses house on Saturday night and then back at it for most of the day on Sunday. My parents left town and in rolled my mother in law, Robin, to help for a few more days. Monday and Tuesday brought more unpacking and organizing and now we are officially on our own in a new city!

I've always enjoyed moving - it gives you the chance to learn a new place, meet new friends, and see what different places have to offer. However, with kiddos moving is a bit more stressful, less fun, more challenging, and doesn't quite allow you as much flexible to just go explore. That being said, I have a feeling we will like it here, that we will meet some new friends - in addition to the ones that we already know here!, and that once we get adjusted things will be good.

We still have an ever growing to do list of things to do around the house before I'd say we are officially settled - tighten curtain rods, hang pictures and prints, organize toy room, organize closets, unpack the garage, get toilet paper holders and towel hooks for bathrooms - this is a new construction home so, per our request, it was left undone, get rid of boxes, unpack garage....you get the picture. 

Although we have a rather long to-do list I am proud to say that every box inside the house is unpacked and relatively where it's suppose to be. I have all the decorating mostly complete, with the exception of actually hanging things on the walls! So we've come along ways in just a weeks time.

The kiddos are adjusting just ok. Of course Preston doesn't know any different but Lily is learning that this is our new house, I think. Once her toys began to fill the space and her room got unpacked I think she realized we were here to stay and not just visiting. Night time has been an adjustment that may take a while to actually adjust to. Lily has woken up almost every night just screaming with fear. You can easily tell she just doesn't know where she is and has a hard time being calmed down, even by Jimmy or I. But we know this is just part of it. Soon (hopefully) she will go back to her usual sleeping pattern and we will all be back to getting good/normal rest.

Other than that things are going well. We spent the morning today exploring our neighborhood park, which is quite impressive, and I plan to spend the afternoon doing some catching up on things other than unpacking or organizing - hence why I'm blogging during nap time :)

More to come, I will post pictures and such once we get things hung on these bare walls!