Living in Houston

My dad went to my blog the other day and said I had not posted anything new recently. Let's see how long it takes him to notice I post something new!

Living in Houston has been incredibly difficult. I miss my friends and my family. I miss living next door to my mom and dad. I am thankful for how much my parents do for my family. I enjoy going back to visit and spending almost all of our time at my parents house. I love watching my grandchildren play at their Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Olivia is in the beginning stages of crawling. She moves her legs, just hasn't gotten the pattern of moving her arms yet. Landon did the army crawl, so maybe she will too. We are struggling to get Olivia to gain weight. She is long and skinny, but absolutely adorable. I love how Landon and Olivia are starting to play together with the same toys. Olivia loves playing toy cars with Landon :)

This post is especially for Sister Peterson! It is people like her and her daughter that make it hard for me to leave the Beaumont ward.

2 months old

Wow! Olivia turned two months old today. So much has happened these past few weeks. Aaron and I went house hunting on the 21st of February. We looked at 7 different houses, and decided to buy the second one we looked at. I am not really looking forward to the move. I am so accustomed to living next door to my parents. It will be a drastic change. Landon loves going over to my parents house. I love going over there too. Growing up, I had the chance to have both sets of my grandparents live next door to our home. I am sad that Landon will not have the same blessing that I did by living so close to his grandparents. I am sure that we will come visit once a week, if not more in the beginning. Our expected closing date on the new house is on the 25th of March.
Olivia does not sleep much during the day. She loves to be held. She can be fast asleep in your arms but the moment you even think about putting her down, she wakes up. She sleeps at night really well. Last week she slept 3 nights in a row without waking up. She is a happy baby. She has been smiling for several weeks now. Olivia was blessed on the 27th. She cried the entire time during her blessing. My family was able to be there, except for Spencer, because it was also the same weekend as my Grandpa's 85th birthday party. It was fun to have everyone in town. Landon loved playing with all of his cousins. I will hate not being able to be next door to my moms when family comes to visit them.
Landon will be turning two this month! He is full of personality. He loves to be silly and make people laugh. He also likes to test my patience. Then when I start to try to discipline him, he gives me his silly smile to make me laugh. Last Sunday, he was playing with Aaron in Aaron's parents front yard. Landon ran over to Olivia gave her a quick kiss then ran off to play again. He is such a great big brother. I love watching the two interact. Landon's favorite movie is Cars. He wakes up in the morning and runs to our room saying "cars, cars". I had originally started to plan a Thomas the Train party for him, but since he started to become obsessed with Cars, thought that maybe he would want a different party theme. Aaron and I took him to Toysrus to pick out his party supplies and I gave him the choice between Cars and Thomas the Train. He actually picked out Thomas. I am excited for his party.

Here are some pictures from Olivia's newborn session (when she was just 5 days old)

wow- what a month!

This past month has been very interesting. Aaron started his new job on January 10th. The night before Aaron started the job, Landon woke up in the middle of the night coughing. He continually got worse, so that Thursday we took him to the doctor. He tested positive for both the flu and RSV. My mom kept Olivia so that she would not be exposed to it any more, but I knew that she had already been exposed and would probably get sick. Well that next week, we had to bring her to the doctor and she tested positive for RSV. It was so sad listening to her have such a big, deep cough. Luckily we were able to keep her out of the hospital. I am blessed to have such a great mom and mother in law who have been a huge help this past month. I don't know how I will do it by myself whenever we move!


Landon learned how to say what the letters M and J say. We are trying to help him say his words clearer. He loves to play outside in his Lightening McQueen car. He also loves to play with sticks that he finds and to play in the dirt.

Olivia is just like her brother and a very easy baby. She sleeps at night from 10:30 to 3:00, eats and is up for around 20 min, then sleeps again till 6:30. She does not cry much during the day. On the night of the 28th, she slept all night.

Landon has started to share his food and drink with her. It will be a miracle if she does not taste "real food" before she is supposed to.

I feel blessed to be the mother to two amazing children.

Olivia Grace was born on January 3rd 2011. She weighed 7 pounds 13 oz and was 19 1/4 in long. When we left the hospital she had dropped down to 7 lbs 7 oz. At the dr office less than 3 days later she was 7 lbs 7 oz and 20 1/2 in long. I think they got her length wrong at the hospital. They measured her twice at the dr because of the big difference.
The labor was VERY long and slow. I started contracting Sunday night around midnight and the contractions began to be every 5 min apart soon after that. I wasn't absolutely sure that it was the real thing, although I was pretty sure. I just didn't want to get to the hospital for them to tell me that I wasn't really in labor and be sent home. Aaron finally convinced me to go at around 3:30. We woke Landon up and brought him to my moms house. The ride to hospital was not fun. The contractions got stronger and closer together. When we got the hospital they were every 2-3 min apart and I was dilated to almost a 4. The contractions stayed that close together for the majority of the day. I walked around the floor for a while and around 9 got my first dose of Nubain so that I could sleep. The contractions were not that bad but I knew I needed sleep because it would be a long day. I ended up getting 2 doses of Nubain throughout the day. The nubain puts me alseep within minutes. One of the times I took it, Aaron had just given me a cup of water and ice chips. Well I fell asleep and it dumped on me. I woke up instantly because it was so cold! Before noon I was at a 6, almost a 7 and we didn't think it would be much longer. But it took forever to get to a 10 from that point on. At 6 pm, my dr came in to check me and when he did my water broke. The contractions were unbearable at that point. I no longer had any pain medicine in my system. Luckily it only took 3 contractions and 5 or 6 pushes to get Olivia out! I was in so much pain all I could think about was to get her out so that I could have more pain meds. As soon as she was born they gave me the final dose of the nubain , which I regret. I do not remember much about Olivia's first moments. I do remember Landon walking into the room for the first time to see his little sister.
The first night we kept Olivia in the nursery so that I could get rest. The next day she spent the entire day in our room. I loved finally being able to hold and bond with her when I didn't have the drugged feeling. My mom brought Landon up to the hospital so that he could see Olivia again. He keeps calling her Cora, his cousin. My mom bought a plant and a balloon for us, that she says is from Landon :)
We got to go home on Wednesday. Landon has adjusted pretty well. He likes to help us throw away her diapers. He also likes to give her blankets and his Beevo blanket. Whenever she has a bottle, he wants his sippy cup. The first night home from the hospital was rough. She cried for a few hours. She wanted to be held while she slept, but I cant sleep when I am holding her because I am afraid I will drop her. I only got about 4 hours of asleep the entire day.
Thursday night went alot better. She only got up at 11:45, 2:30, and 6 to eat. She would eat and go right back to sleep.
Naptime is interesting with Landon now. He wakes up when she starts to cry and wont go back to sleep.
On Friday he was still adjusting well. She spit her pacifier out when we were in his room, so he went and got it for her. He is very sweet and loving! Friday night went really well. She ate at 11, 4, then not again till 6.

I love being a mom to two! I will have the real test of taking care of 2 kids on Monday when Aaron goes back to work. It will be a huge adjustment for all of us.

so far this summer

School is consuming much of my time this summer. I am taking two online classes. I was going to take the summer off, but I wanted to get as much school over with as I can before the next baby is born. In the fall I will be taking two online classes and then going to Lamar for two other classes. I am nervous about actually going back to campus. I have gotten out of the habit of having to study for tests. My online classes haven't been the easiest, but I still didn't have to study much for any of them. I am not taking any classes in the spring. I am not sure I will be able to manage school and two little ones.

Landon is finally walking everywhere. He had lots of fun playing with his cousins last weekend while they were in town for my dad's 60th birthday. My mom rented a big water slide. Landon liked trying to climb up it on the slide. Hopefully we will have a big "family fun" day each summer.

Landon has added a few words to his vocabulary. The latest one is "again". He says again to his daddy to let him know he wants to be thrown back up in the air.

Yesterday I went to another dr appointment. The baby's heartbeat is very strong. I love hearing that sound. Next time Aaron will actually be able to be with me. In 5 or 6 weeks we will be finding out what we are having. I'm pretty sure its a boy, or at least thats what I am trying to mentally prepare myself for. I will be happy as long as we have a healthy baby.

Not feeling so good

So last Saturday we had gone swimming with oldest sister and her two girls. Landon kept trying to put his head in the water to drink it, but twice he went too far and ended up breathing it in. The next day he got a croup cough. My brother in law, a respiratory therapist, said he would be ok, but to just watch for a fever. The next few days Landon wasn't really acting himself. Yesterday, I just knew I needed to take him in to the doctor because he was getting worse not better. My poor little one year old has bronchitis and pneumonia and on top of those two things, a sinus infection. I hate seeing my little one not feel good. His eyes were so swollen yesterday, I felt terrible for him. I am amazed, though, that he still manages to wrinkle up his nose and smile really big. I am blessed to have such a sweet little boy.