Family of 5!

October 9, 2017

A new blog post has been a long time coming since so much has happened in our household in the past month and a half.  Firstly, Peter Wyatt was born on Aug 22! After what seemed like an incredibly long pregnancy, yet a super quick 4-hour labor, Peter was born at 9:57pm weighing in at 9 lbs 3 ounces. (you can read my labor story here). 

He has been a joy to have home with us since he entered the door. He is super independent and loves playing on his jungle gym mat. He just lays there and looks at all the colors, flashing lights and “dances”.  He has grabbed a toy a couple of times, but I think it may have been by accident, or we have a super advanced baby!

I like to think the latter.  He coos in a high-pitched scream that his Auntie (Danielle) thinks sounds like an eagle, but his dad and I say is along the lines of a velociraptor.  He cried when he needs something, but is otherwise a very happy baby (starting to smile on his 5 week birthday), until the evening on some days when he must be so tired from all the excitement of the day (which includes a lot of naps, eating, pooping and very noisy sisters), that he just needs to cry it out.  I mean, I feel like that some days, too, so I can’t blame him. 

He sleeps pretty well and has been giving us 4-5 hour stretches at night for the past couple of weeks: not every night, but enough to recharge us. Peter has a super strong neck (was born with it) and is solid like a rock.  At 7 weeks old tomorrow, I think his weight is closing in on the 12 pound mark.  

We brought him home and Maddie just adored him. She wanted to be around him and to hold him all the time.

For Sarah, it took a little getting used to.  For the first few weeks, she kind of kept her distance.  She would play nearby him, but wouldn't approach him and ask to touch him, hug and kiss him like Maddie would. Now Sarah has warmed up, too, and lays with him on his mat and, when she sees him randomly throughout the day will announce in her sweet Sarah voice, “ Oh, Peter.”  She also will tell us, “I love him.”

Both girls are super gentle with Peej and super helpful, too. Maddie holds the doors for me whenever I have the stroller and the two of them help me wash his hair in the bath, fetch me my nursing pillow and burp cloths and pat his back to burp him.  

The first couple of weeks after Peter was born, we took lots of adventures out of the house together as a family. It was lovely!

We still try to make it to the park here and there or just hang out in the backyard when we can, but its getting harder now that Maddie is in school (half days M-F) and the weather is starting to turn a little chillier.  Its been an unseasonably warm Fall, so far, but the mornings tend to be cold.

Maddie is doing great in school, though! She loves it and is making lots of friends. 

She also is a Spark in Awana at church this year and is blowing us away with her Bible Verse memorizing.  I was slacking a little bit this week with reading her the lessons in her book and when we opened it up, Phil mentioned the Bible reference to her and before even reading the verse for the first time, she spouted it out! So, we moved onto the next one and she knew that one too.  Unbeknownst to us, she had been listening to the lessons in her room on her CD player and memorizing the verses on her own.  Out of the mouths of babes! We are so proud of our little goof.

Sarah is doing great, too.  She plays so well on her own when we are home in the mornings while Mads is at school.  I’m enjoying the time with just her and Peter, although I’ve been running more errands and doing more cleaning than I probably should.  I really need to make more of an effort to spend the few hours we have alone together TOGETHER.  Sarah celebrated her third birthday this past week and also had a doctor’s appointment.

She is super tall for her age and super smart according to her doctor.  We also saw the neurologist and have decided to wean Sarah off of her epilepsy medication now that it’s been nearly 2 years with no seizures (praise the Lord!).  Sarah is a Puggle in Awana again this year and loves going every week.  She loves singing all the songs from church and does a surprisingly amazing job at telling me the Bible stories she has learned in Sunday School.  I am really loving watching how the Lord is forming their little hearts for His Kingdom.  

I am so glad Maddie and Sarah are so close together in age.   They truly love each other and love playing together.  Its fun to watch them play “Family” and call each other “sweetie”. They carry around 10 babies at a time and lay them in Peter’s seats, bouncers, swings…etc.  They give them all blankets, pretend to breastfeed them, and give them pacifiers. Its so cute!

They have all types of inch-sized little toys (princesses, mickey mouses, little people superheroes) that they play with too. I laugh sometimes when Maddie takes control. She tells sarah what to say and Sarah follows suit: 

Maddie: “Oh sweetie, do you have a boo-boo. Sarah say wahhhh”

Sarah: “wahhhhh” 

So, its been a really great month and a half. We’ve had tons of visitors - family and friends - and my sister, Danielle has come to spend a day with me pretty much every week since Peter was born.  She brings along little Gigi, who is only 16 days older than our little boy.  We feel so blessed. 

Summer Time with the Joneses: Mini Vacation, Potty Training and Backyard Camping

What a fun summer we are having! And it's only the end of June, still! Heres a quick pictorial review of what we have been up to: 

A trip to the Brookfield zoo! 

Don't let all the cute pictures fool you.  For some reason, our little family struggles with zoo trips, but we keep trying them out. 

All-in-all, we had a fun dyad ate a delicious picnic where we thought we may actually be eaten by the geese inn the area, but it sure was exhausting trying to keep these two kids from running a muck! 

But despite the struggles, we still strive to build the family memories and have fun times together.  

And I think we have a pretty good time.  We all like each other a lot, so as long as we are together, we are a happy crew! 

Another fun event we tried out for the first time this summer is backyard camping! We would like to work our way up to the real deal and take a camping vacation, but with me being super pregnant, I think my desire to camp this year has dissipated. 

They all slept fine both times around, as you can see.... 

Happy as a clam! But me, on the other hand, I really struggled even on the air mattress the second time  around.  

But, we had a really fun time playing backyard bocce... 

...and just hanging out by the fire.... 

...and playing on the patio with our toys. We were glad to have easy access to bathrooms right inside the house, too! 

We made hot dogs, baked beans, fish and s'mores over the fire pit. 

and we went on a "pajama walk" with lanterns around our neighborhood before zipping up the tent for the night.  We really really had a fun time both times we pitched the tent.  

And this update has no pictures associated with it, but after I stopped working (part-time), we decided to give potty training a go with little Sarah Bearah.  She did great.  It was about 2 days before she got the hang of going pee pee on the potty.  Poopy was a little tougher, but we have made some great progress (and currently are already regressing, but I know it will pass - pun intended- in time).  We were so proud of her that she was able to make it through our whole mini Madison vacation without a single accident.  We were concerned about being away from home and how that would effect her progress, but she is a champ and exceeded our expectations.  Way to go, Sarah!!! 

And that is a good segue into our vacation! We took a 1 night, 2 days trip up to Madison, WI and had the time of our lives.  The girls LOVED the beach.  I think this was my favorite part of the trip.  We spent hours there digging in the sand, 

playing in the water, 

pretending to be mermaids and snacking on goldfish and quiznos sandwiches.  I can't wait to make another beach trip.  

We also checked out the Madison Children's Museum while we were up there.  It is super cute! They have this beautiful rooftop garden area that we explored. 

Maddie and Sarah really loved playing in the kitchen and making us pies and pizzas. 

And later on, in another area, Sarah discovered the babies spent tons of time changing their diapers and putting them to sleep.  She's going to make such a great big sister! 

On day two, we took a trip to the Madison Zoo and walked around for an hour and a half or so.  Remember how I said that zoo trips are diffficult for us? Well, this time around, after several warnings, we ultimately left due to the kids misbehaving: fighting with each other, running off in opposite directions, whining....   But, other than that, the zoo was really cute.  We got to hear a lion roar and were super close to all of the animals.  Overall, I think we all had a really fun time on our mini trip. 

Side note that I thought was funny: The reason we took the trip at all was because of our rule about our recently purchased mini-van: you cannot watch tv in the car unless we are on vacation.  Well, Maddie kept asking about it and I finally said I would talk to Phil about taking a vacation for the sole purpose of her being able to use the car's dvd players.  So, our trip happened all because a 4.5 year old wanted to watch movies while driving.  Well, I'm glad we went! 

The resto of our summer has been spent hanging in the backyard, building a garden fence that the local bunnies can't penetrate, playdates, VBS at various churches and tea parties.   

A friend of ours from church bought us some yummy pastries, so that evening, we decided to sit down and enjoy them all together with tea and hot cocoa. 

We invited the teddy bears, too, and had a really nice evening enjoying our little family. 

It's really been a fun few months.  this little trouble maker had grown by leaps and bounds.  We love listening to her quirky voices she makes when playing with her sister.  I wish you could hear her say, "Is everybody ready?" in her daddy pig voice (from the show "peppa pig").  when she agrees with something you've said, instead of saying, "Me, too" she says, "me one," and it cracks me up every time.  She is super tall, wearing big girl undies and already can recite her months of the year, count up to 20, knows all her colors and shapes and recites most of the words to her favorite songs (especially Moana).  She makes me laugh ALL THE TIME.  She starts almost every sentence with a gasp of excitement and "mama! you know what?!?!" Her expressions, are priceless, too.  This girl can show pure joy on her face on second and break your heart with her tears the next. She is so excited for her little brother and is always giving "Sho Sho" his and kisses. I just love her. 

And this little princess is so sweet.  Her smile is possibly the most gorgeous thing I have ever seen.  She gives the bestt snuggles, especially in the morning.  One day, she came into my room at around 7am and I was in the bathroom showering.  She was so sad I wasn't in bed and cried and cried.  I asked her why she was so upset and she told me it was because she didn't get to sleep with me.  For months now, the girls will come into my bed in the morning and we snuggle together for about 5-10 minutes before starting our day.  It is my favorite part of the day, but I hadn't realized how special it was to Maddie, too.  Well, we made sure to hop back into bed and snuggle that day to make up for it.  What a sweet, sensitive, kind heart she has.  She has a drive and desire to make people happy, she loves playing with her sister more than anything in the world (even if they do fight amongst the playing) and she is a great story teller.  She loves numbers right now and always wants me to tell her how to count to a specific number....usually a really high one.  Her courage continues to astound me as she tries new things all the time, like climbing trees and up the side of her bunk bed, going on new roller coasters at Santa's Village and jumping off tall platforms.  I could listen to her talk in her cute voice all day long, but most of all, I love her laugh.  She has the best laugh of all time and all it takes is the tiniest tickle to get it out of her.

 I am so blessed.