Family of Four!!

On Sunday, July 4, 201o at 9:57am our family grew from 3 to 4. Our precious little girl, Presley Anne, was born weighing 7 pounds, 13 ounces and 20.5 inches long. She came to this world with a ton of beautiful jet black hair. There was no better feeling than hearing that little cry when she arrived. We are so blessed. She is now 4 weeks old today as I am writing this and WOW...time has flown already. She is doing great and growing everyday. Her hair is turning curly, which I love!! She is as sweet as can be except when she's hungry...watch out...the girl has some lungs! She cries much louder than Brooke ever did so we just have to laugh sometimes at how mad she gets!! Brooke has adjusted so well. She wants to be involved with her as we are doing things with Presley. She helps us change her diaper (she actually is mostly curious about Presley's "poops" as Brooke calls it). She likes to help us feed her and loves to tickle Presley's feet. The only time Brooke doesn't really care for Presley is sometimes when Daddy is holding P. Brooke wants him to hold her instead but besides for that...all is good. We are amazed at how fast the past 4 weeks have gone by. We were so blessed to have had help from Scott's Mom, Aunt Judy, my Mom, and so many friends that have brought us countless dinners and gifts. We feel so lucky to have such wonderful people in our lives. Thank you all so much for being so thoughtful and generous. Right after our little angel was born...

She's here!!

I am still in amazement that we have 2 little girls. God is good.

Proud Papa!

Aunt Lisa!

Look at that hair!

Brooke coming to meet Presley for the 1st time..she was thrilled!

Checking her out...

My loves...

Our Pastor, Stephen

Presley and Clara (Tom and Candace, who are 2 of our good friends, had Clara the day after Presley was born! It was so much fun being in the hospital together!)

Mama Suz!

The proud Grandma's!

Our new family photo!

Trying to teach her to be gentle with this little one....

My girl...

SISTERS!!

This and That...

The past couple of weeks we have been doing a little bit of everything. One thing we've especially been doing is trying to stay cool!! It's been crazy hot here so we've pretty much spent most of our time either at the pool or indoors. My swollen feet can't take this heat! :) Brooke cracks me up so much because she is loving laughing at herself these days and trying to make me laugh. I love this little girl so much...I feel so blessed that another little angel is about to arrive. Showing off her shades...she is just now liking to wear sunglasses. She never has wanted to wear them before!

Ready for bed but wanting her glasses!

She got her 1st haircut in probably a year! She did great and couldn't wait to get a lollipop afterwards!

Strolling her bear around with her oven mitts and sparkly shoes! I am loving this total girl stage she is in. She loves anything princess and wants her toenails painted all the time!! Too cute...

Playing with her friends... Melaina and Lydia.

Weekend Fun!

Lisa and the kids came back to town on Thursday and stayed till Saturday afternoon. We stay BUSY when they are here and the kids have so much fun together!! Brooke kept saying "my cousins" all weekend! She absolutely adores Adelyn and Caden and love spending so much time with them. We were busy swimming, playing at the park, riding George the Train, flying kites, going to the farmer's market, and eating lots of yummy food! Brooke in her fish floaty. We cannot believe she loves to hang out in this in the adult pool and just float around. Such a change from last year when we had to hold her the whole time!

Adelyn swimming around!

Lisa and Caden hanging out!

Me and baby girl... 34 1/2 weeks prego!

All the kids riding the train at the park...

Caden trying to fly the dragon kite...

Adelyn and Brooke waiting in line for their turn to fly! (We had to make them get in a line otherwise they were all fighting for the kite!)

Brooke flying the princess kite!! We had much better luck with this one instead of the dragon kite. (To be honest, I cannot believe this one flew at all because there was not 1 drop of wind!)

Go Brooke Go!!

Adelyn running fast to get it high in the air!

On Saturday morning, we met our Sunday School class at the dog park for a little doggy date. Roxy was SO happy! She got to play in the creek and have fun with the other dogs. It's been a long time since Roxy had a play date. :)

Of course she had to get cozy in the creek muddy water. :)

Back at Nana's after Lisa and the kids left. Nana has the perfect painting setup in her garage that Brooke loves to play with. This time there were no brushes...just hands. She painted her entire stomach and had a blast!

Great weekend...it's only 4:30 right now...we're off to the pool in just a bit! I LOVE SUMMERTIME!

Happy Cow Creamery

Last week I took Brooke to the Happy Cow Creamery and met up with Carrie, Julie, and their boys. The creamery is an organic dairy farm and they take you on a tour to see where the cows are milked and show you where the milk is bottled. It was such a cute little place and we got to ride on a "trolley" ride but really it was a tractor pulling us in a row of seats. The kids loved it and we had a good time too!! We got to sample their delicious milks afterwards. It was the first time Brooke had ever had chocolate milk...she kept saying "this is my FAVORITE!!". It was too cute.

Me and my girl on the tractor ride!

Watching all the cows eat. They LOVED this!

Trying chocolate milk..YUM!

Brooke Update and Baby Girl #2

Scott and I are constantly looking at each other and saying that we feel like the 2 luckiest and blessed parents there are to have Brooke as our daughter. I'm sure every parent feels this way but having this little ray of sunshine in our lives makes us so grateful everyday. She is full of personality, whit, creativity, sweetness, fiestiness (if that is a word), kindness, will power, and so many more things. Her speech amazes me everyday with full sentences and it's great that we have normal conversations now. We were talking yesterday about her baby sister coming and we had about a 20 minute conversation about it. It depends on the day about how excited she is that she has to "share her toys" as she puts it. She has no idea how much she is going to love having another child in the house. I know it may be difficult at first for her but she will grow to love her little one.

These days Brooke is into painting, play-doh, and using glue to make art. We glue everything...shapes, balls, you name it...it gets glued! She loves to play outside and swing and ride her scooter. She is still learning to ride it but is inspired to go fast like the neighborhood kids. I can see it in her eyes when she is riding it. We water our plants every night and it is one of my favorite times of day and favorite things to do with her. She loves to help me water and she has 2 plants of her own that she is responsible for. Her plants are looking better than mine! She has her 1st crush on the boy next door...ugh! He is 5 years old and a sweetie pie (he is in the picture above). We watch her little face light up when she sees him and plays with him. It's really cute ....Scott and I just look at each other and smile. Our little girl...watching her is a dream come true.

This pregnancy has been different than mine with Brooke. There is an OBGYN that lives in our neighborhood and as we were talking the other day I told her about how this one felt different. She starting laughing and said "Of course it will...you weren't chasing after a 2 1/2 year old last time!" . She's right, keeping up with Brooke has definitely challenged me but has made the time fly by. Overall, this pregnancy has been good, just little differences that I'm sure are going to happen as your body expands again.

Foods I have craved versus last time:
- Oreos ( I seriously have to limit myself to 6 per day....yes, I said LIMIT!)
- Cheese-its (Not the hot and spicy ones though like I craved last time)
- Ice ( I cannot stop chewing it...weird)
- Bagels and cream cheese (I think I have had one everyday)
- Cereal (pretty much all kinds but specifically Kashi Cinnamon Harvest, Crispix, Multigrain Cheerios)
- Ground beef (cooked with anything... I know Scott is so sick of it!)

When I was pregnant with Brooke I would have an egg/cheese bagel sandwich pretty much every morning. This time, I have to choke down eggs...not feeling those.

7 more weeks till this little one arrives and we CANNOT WAIT!! The nursery is partially ready, we are using the same bedding we had for Brooke and are just going to change up the wall decor. Other than that, I just need to get a few more things. Brooke is in her big girl room and doing great. Naps are a challenge right now because she continues to get out of her bed. But, nighttime is great and she wakes up about 2 times a night to go to the potty. She just wakes up and says "Daddy" and he takes her to the potty and she goes right back to bed. Off to paint, glue, or play something else...!!

Lisa and the kids

We love living so close to my sister and her family! They only live a little under 2 1/2 hours away, which makes it so easy to visit each other. Lisa brought the kids over on Saturday and they stayed for the night. We had such an awesome day with the kids...it's amazing how they just know they are family. Brooke loves Caden and Adelyn so much and is constantly asking to see them. It is the sweetest bond... Nana playing play-doh with the kiddos at her house!

Lisa and the kids swinging on our porch! Brooke and Adelyn checking out Roxy in the backyard.

Adelyn was so sweet and loved feeling my tummy. I think she really gets what's going on inside and kept wanting to feel the baby. I loved it!

All the kids swinging at the park!

Brooke just went down the big slide and was probably screaming "AGAIN!!!"

Our little climber!

Caden and Brooke collided and Adelyn was checking B to make sure she was okay!

Scott is awesome with all the kids together! He keeps all of us motivated and keeps them running and seriously wears them out!! We love it. :)