Smile

Well, as you can tell we have fallen behind on posting pictures since grandma & grandpa went home. We are looking forward to more visitors and a little help with the kids in early March when Grandma Linda & Grandpa Dave get here.

Our big news today is that our precious little Ruby, just 3 1/2 weeks old, had her first REAL smiles today! I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it for my very own eyes, since the boys were closer to 7 weeks when they first smiled. But, it really is true! I was holding her and talking, smiling of course, and there it was. She did it 3 times throughout the day. It's the most beautiful thing. Her little eyes disappear when the smile overtakes her chubby little cheeks!

We think that maybe she's just happy that within a day or 2 she will no longer be the youngest member of our family. Uncle Taylor & Auntie Pam are set to have a baby at any moment:)

Ruby Suzanne is here!!

The boys meet Ruby for the first time.
Ruby about 12 Hours Old.

We are so excited to announce the birth of baby Ruby. She made her entrance into the world at 8:28 pm on Sunday Jan 11th after only 1 push! Ruby is our biggest baby 8 lbs 11 oz and 21.25 inches long. She's absolutely perfect, beautiful, and healthy - we are so proud.

As the blog shows, I started labor Saturday morning. Contractions were kind of slow to get started, but Cody stayed home from work, cleaned up the house and got things ready for baby. By that evening contractions had stopped so we went to walk around the store and had dinner out with friends. That night was the biggest full moon of the year which apparently means something to babies! I started having consistent uncomfortable labor pains at 4am Sunday morning. By 8am we decided to head to the midwifery clinic. We were the 3rd baby of the day which is a lot for the 3 room clinic.

Labor was still a bit slow because I had a lot of excess amniotic fluid. The midwives aren't quick to break the waters since they like things to go natural. They helped me get dilated to about 5 cm which took most of the day. At 5:30pm, they broke my water and the real fun...er...should I say pain began. The midwives predicted Ruby would be born within 4 hours of my water breaking and sure enough she was born just 3 hours later. Those were the hardest 3 hours of my life. Oh my gosh. The midwives are awesome about suggesting different positions. They had me in the bath, in the bed, sitting, laying, etc. Finally we found a good position.

Unfortunately Ruby has a mind of her own already. She refused to turn her head and her body in the right position so she got sort of stuck. My midwives were incredible though and just patiently helped my body do what its made to do. With their help I literally only pushed once and Ruby was here.

Now we are relaxing at home. Feeling very elated & enjoying letting all three of our beautiful children get to know each other.

Keep checking - we'll have pictures posted within a day or two. xoxo

She's Coming

Well folks, I'm laying here in bed trying to rest and relax per midwifes instructions. Thought I would do a little blogging to pass the time between contractions. Midwife says it looks like I've gone into "natural hormonal labor" you know - all the touchy feely stuff! We're excited, a little uncomfortable, but looking forward to meeting our little girl.

We'll keep you posted - could be today or even tomorrow!

Baby Update

Many of you have been asking about baby Ruby, so here is a quick little update. No, she has not yet arrived. She is quite comfy way up high in my tummy. My body is all ready for her, but due to her posterior (sunny side up) position, she's having a hard time moving down into place. I've been spending lots of time crawling around the floor with the boys and cleaning in order to encourage her to turn so that her back is laying restfully in my tummy - but no success yet. She isn't required to move of course, but it would make things a little easier (and faster) for mommy. Say a little prayer that she will turn her back around and move down into place.

Now, as for me. I'm feeling anxious about this whole process. I'm very ready for Ruby to make her entrance into the world, especially since we are beyond the point that I delivered both the boys. It's clear to see Ruby is different from the start! The good news is that she just might hang out long enough for Grandma and Grandpa to arrive. That would be very special and is something I'm trying to focus on!!!

Wyatt

We are finally starting to get settled back in the Valley. We have a temporary home that we are renting from a friend of a friend. It's a beautiful home that we fit in perfectly, unfortunately its also for sale (out of our range) so we'll just be here a short time. We've hit the pavement running with Wyatt's speech stuff. We met with the school district on Tuesday to determine if Wyatt would be eligible for the special needs pre-school. They tested his receptive & expressive language skills & determined that his receptive skills are above average and his expressive skills are on the lowest end of average. What does it all mean? He's a super smart little boy who needs some help learning to talk. And, he does qualify for pre-school. It's a language based program where the teachers & aides have all been trained by the school speech pathologist. The speech path also visits the classroom throughout the week to do individual and small group therapy with the kids. Our big guy will be going 2 1/2 hours a day four days a week. He can even ride the BUS! I kindly said thanks but no thanks to the bus ride, I still have to maintain some little bit of his baby-hood!! Anyhow, we met with our private SLP today. She said that he definitely has some symptoms of Apraxia and she will treat it as Apraxia for now. She actually specializes in treating kids with Apraxia, so we are really excited & feel very fortunate to have her. So, speech starts Monday & school starts May 1st, wish Wyatt luck in his new ventures!

Proud Uncle & Auntie

We are so proud to update our friends and family on how well our newest niece, Graci Elaine, is doing! She came home after about 5 weeks in the NICU. She gained about 2 pounds and 4 inches while there!! Momma, Daddy, and brother will travel a cautious road in the next few months - making sure she stays healthy and keeps on growing strong. But, she's had a wonderful start so far. We are so thankful for the health of our new beautiful Graci from God.

Cody, the boys and I were fortunate enough to spend a couple weeks with the family in Oregon while Graci was in the hospital. We spent lots of time with big brother Colton, so that momma and daddy could focus on other things. We also got to see Graci a few times which was a total blessing. There is no feeling like holding such a tiny precious baby in your arms.

The entire family has so much to be grateful for this Thanksgiving!

Graci Elaine

This is our Graci Elaine. She was born to Charlotte, Steve, and Colton (Cody's sister & fam) on 10/15. She weighed 3 lbs 9 oz and was 15 1/2" long. She has since gained 3 oz and is already nursing. She's not on any special equipment, but must stay in the hospital for at least 6 weeks to make sure that she can breathe and eat on her own. Thank you to everyone for their prayers, she is a strong little girl and is doing better than expected. We are headed to Eugene in a couple days to help take care of Colton so that Char can spend lots of time with Graci at the hospital. Lets keep praying that she grows big and strong and gets to come home as soon as possible. xoxo

Say a Prayer

Hello Friends and Family,

Our newest niece, Grace Elaine, was born at 12:21 today at 30 1/2 weeks gestation. Her momma (Cody's sister, Charlotte) went into pre-term labor for unknown reasons. We've been told that Grace cried after delivery (Good sign) and that momma got to hold her. Please add Grace and our family to your prayers.

More News

I'll keep this short. We just wanted to let everyone know that Cody's employer has been more than supportive in our big adventure in parenting. They've given him the go ahead to make the necessary moving plans to meet Wyatt's needs. We are still planning to stay in Petersburg for at least 6 more months while we work with the new speech therapist and attempt to sell our house. More later. xoxo

Juneau

Well, as many of you know Wyatt and I just took a trip to Juneau to get to know his new speech therapist. Our meetings with her were really successful and we came away with some great exercises to do with Wyatt home. She also agreed to make the trip to Petersburg a few times over the next 6 months. So, needless to say we are really excited and feeling very optimistic at this point. Our trip was scheduled to be about 24 hours which was just barely enough time to do some shopping and eat a good meal after our appointments. To our surprise, we ended up on a plane with mechanical problems 2 days in a row - yes - we were on the exact same plane, with the same mechanical problem 2 days in a row. The first day we opted to stay in Juneau where we explored the historic down town area (very cool - every one should see it), saw the capitol, eat a great dinner, and took Wyatt to play group. We loved downtown Juneau, it's literally built right into the mountain side between the mountains and the water. It reminded me of San Francisco with the really steep & curvy one way streets, old houses, and cool little shops. There is already quite a bit of snow in the mountains there, so we know it will be coming to Petersburg soon.

After the second day of cancelled flights, we opted to fly to Ketchikan in order to beat a fierce storm on the way with 100mph winds forcasted in Juneau. Ketchikan was supposed to be better with only 70mph winds - we had no idea what to expect for Petersburg. Let me tell you about Ketchikan. The airport is not on the same island as the town, so you have to take a ferry or a water taxi from the airport to town. In our case, AK Air provided us with a water taxi. Now imagine, I have a 2 year old, luggage, and a car seat - and I'm running from the airport to the dock in 70mph winds and rain. YIKES!! There was a nice man who helped us, but it was still miserable.

Now on to Petersburg...As many of you probably don't realize, our airport is so tiny that it cannot accommodate any amount of wind, fog, dense snow, etc. The moons really have to align to land here. So after a night in Ketchikan we set off for Petersburg, stopping first in Wrangell which is only 12 minutes (by air) from Petersburg. Things looked great there and the pilots got the "okay" to try Petersburg. Unfortunately for us, the fog and wind had moved in that short 12 minutes. I've never been on such a rough flight. The plane was silent, people just stared out the foggy windows hoping we could safely land. Wyatt fell asleep sitting up like a big boy in his very own seat. I had to keep my hand across his chest so that he wouldn't flop around with all the turbulence. Luckily for us our pilots were patient and decided to circle around for a second try at Petersburg. They were able to land but it was scary. Turns out they were more interested in landing because they needed fuel since they expected to fly direct to Anchorage bypassing the scheduled stop in Juneau where there really bad weather sat.

Long story short, we made it home 3 days over due - but - safe, sound, and very thankful !

Good News

Hello All, We recently received some good news - so we thought an update was due! As many of you know, Wyatt was recently diagnosed with Apraxia (a speech/language/communication disorder) which has been very trying on us as a family while we try to make some decisions about how to best treat it. The typical treatment for this disorder is regular intensive speech therapy, sometimes up to 5 days a week. Our problem is that there are NO speech therapists on our tiny little island :( So, our good news is that we just received a couple of awesome grants to help us with his speech therapy needs. Wyatt and momma will be traveling to Juneau this week for an intake eval with a speech therapist there, then she will come visit us in Petersburg 1 time a month for the next 6 months. As part of the grant, we also got money so that I can go to a seminar on Apraxia in Portland. We are so excited to finally be starting Wyatt's therapy!

As for other news in our household...we have decided to try to sell the house and move up near Anchorage so that when our grant expires we can be close to more speech therapists. We found one who has already put Wyatt on her list for March. Now we just have to get Cody's employer to agree to this plan AND most importantly - we have to sell the house. So, keep praying for us that both those obstacles can be overcome.

On another happy note: Both boys are doing well. Isaac is getting more and more active all the time. He's got quite a sense of humor and should also be considered our 'dramatic' child! He's walking 100% now and even trying to run (usually away from me when he's being naughty, lol). Wyatt has been working on his numbers and colors. So far, most everything is blue and 2 (you see the phonetic pattern here), but he's trying. He's also helping me sing "Old MacDonald" by doing the "eieio" part! Too Cute.

Stay tuned. We'll keep adding updates. xoxo Meg

Autumn In Petersburg

Well it looks like fall has officially reached Petersburg. The air is noticeably cooler and the leaves are starting to fall. The boys and I are back from our trip to Oregon. It was a very nice trip, we were able to do lots of fun stuff with both sides of the family. We also hit all the doctors that we can't see here (check out our "Links" I added one with info about Wyatt). Grandma Linda L. got to spend Cody's 30th birthday with him here in Petersburg - she also came for Cody's 25th birthday, that was his first full summer in the North! Wow does time fly. Isaac took his time learning to walk, but is now a full blown toddler. He's not really content with just walking, he'd much rather climb things like the baby gates, the latter to the top bunk, and up on the dining room table. He spent his 1st birthday with Grandma & Grandpa L. in Oregon. They had a special dinner, cupcakes and packages - what fun!!

We've Moved!

Hi Friends and Family, well we have finally made the big move to our new house. We signed the papers and it became officially ours on June 29th. This makes for the 2nd birthday that I've received a HOUSE in 3 years (we closed on our first house on June 24th, 04). It's hard be believe how many changes have occurred since then. We've added 2 handsome sons and moved to a completely new town! All is well here in Petersburg. Wyatt celebrated his 2nd birthday quietly at home with Cody, Isaac and I. He's working on using the 'big boy potty' and is learning to talk with signs. All and all he is your typical 2 year old - tantrums included! Isaac has started babbling mamama, dadada, and bababa but he doesn't seem to know what any of it means just yet. He has also taken several 1/2 steps but is quick to drop back into the crawl position as soon as he realizes he's not holding on to anything. It won't be long before we have 2 full blown toddlers on our hands. We still have our trip to Oregon planned for August. It will be a busy trip though, and like always, we probably wont get to see everyone we would like to. Both boys have doctor appointments while we are there, since the doc scene here is very limited. So between appointments and weddings we hope to get everyone in. I'm also dying to do some old 'Eugene' stuff that I miss, like take a walk around Alton Baker park, check out the Saturday market, and eat at some yummy spots. We'll see if I get to do any of that! Until next time. Love Always, CMWI&R.

Update

Hello to all our faithful bloggers out there. We have some sad news in the picture department. Apparently the "Blog Spot" requires a different type of security then what we have for posting pictures. So, until we change our security there will be no pictures posted. Sorry, sorry, sorry:( I thought I would go ahead an update everyone on whats going on with our life anyway. I supposed I'll need to be more detailed as I wont have pictures to back me up! We'll start with me, ummm...I'm exactly the same as always. Hows that? Actually I am getting very excited and looking forward to the fact that we are buying a house. We have been looking for that perfect house since November. In Petersburg you either get too old, too expensive, or too small. So, we are so excited to have found a place just a stones throw from where we are renting. No, its not on the water, but it's close. So we don't want that to discourage anyone from visiting! I'm also excited to be planning 2 vacations soon. First, just the boys and I are headed to Oregon for a couple of weddings. It will be August and we could be there as long as a month. We'll keep you posted. Then in December the entire family, including Grandpa Greg & Grandma Linda are headed to Ixtapa Mexico! On to Cody...Cody has been working it seems like non-stop since we got to Petersburg. He's now in the middle of week 3 without a day off. He's on a Herring Fishery patrol with no known return date. The boys and I miss him desperately. He's also been busy with the new boat and looking forward to the fun it will offer him in the way of hunting and fishing. Wyatt, is talking more and more each day. Today he told the dog to stay and lay down with hand gestures and all. So cute. He's getting a little more sassy lately, maybe its the 2 year old thing, maybe he's missin' daddy. He's also eating like a champ and gaining weight slow but sure! Isaac, wow he's getting to be such a big boy. Isaac must be watched like a hawk now days because he will climb stairs and eat anything in site if you let him. He crawls very good and is getting faster daily. He's standing up and trying to cruise also. He just started saying mamamama and babababa. I don't think he knows what it means just yet. And finally Ruckus. Well he's fine. Somehow he continues to live thru life with 2 babies in the house. He routinely eats things like grapes, raisins, diapers, 2 bars of soap, etc. And, that was just yesterday! xoxo