House Update

As of this weekend, the trim is up and ready to be painted. Matt is finishing up taping and will begin using Dean Anderson's high powered sprayer to paint the trim and the primer hopefully by this weekend. Yea! The cabinets turned out nice. I especially love my red kitchen wall! I will love it even more when it gets totally painted - you can't see it very well but it's a very deep red.
This is the very deep ravine behind our house. Gavin loves it, but we're going to need a fence for Cael!

Well, personally I think I'm doing very well for myself. Blogging once every two months - not bad.....for me ;). There has been a lot going on in the last two months. Cael got RSV at 8 weeks and had to be on breathing treatments for a week or so. It was just a few days before I had to go back to work. We had to go to the doctor twice during that time and get x-rays each time we went. When the x-ray tech asked me if there was any way I could be pregnant I laughed at her. With the breathing treatments, Cael quickly got over his sickness and has been the happiest little boy. He smiles at everyone now. He's not stingy with them at all. He loves to laugh out loud. I think he laughs the most at his papa, though. Last week, Cael started getting a cold. So I took him to the doctor on Monday and he has RSV again. So as of now, we are back on breathing treatments. Good news though, the doctor said his ears were immaculant and that the cold season is almost over! He also had to go for his 2 month shots yesterday (I know, I'm about a month behind). I expected him to scream uncontrollably for awhile, but he was such a good boy and only cried for a few seconds. Cael has also been sleeping through the night for a few weeks now. It's glorious! One of the sweetest things is to watch Gavin interacting with Cael. Gavin can get lots of smiles out of him. Lately, Cael comes with Matt and I to put Gavin to bed. After Gavin has done all of his bedtime routines and we have done his devotional, Gavin gets out his old storybook bible and reads a story to Cael. Last night we layed Cael down next to Gavin and he looked at the book and smiled the whole time. It was so sweet. It blesses my heart to see Gavin reading the bible to Cael. He's such a good big brother to him. Well, I'll leave you with some pictures. I need to post again soon, because Matt wants to show off his progress on the house. We should be in it in the next few months - yea!

My boys as Spiderman and a Penguin

Big Smile!

Big Hair!

Christmas 2008

We started off our Christmas season by decorating a gingerbread house. I was in charge of the icing. Gavin was in charge of the candies and Matt, well, he was in charge of his iPhone.

The finished product - 1 hour later

The next day Gavin decided he wanted to read to Cael. Gavin has become an excellent reader and just sat down and read Cael books that he had never read before. He read each word perfectly, pretty impressive and possibly the sweetest time I've spent with the boys together so far. Cael stayed awake for awhile but eventually was put to sleep by the time Gavin had read the 5th book.

On Christmas day Gavin's major gift from us were two hermit crabs. He named them Scooby Doo and Crystal. I think they are the creepiest pets ever, but he loves them and chases Jesse around the house holding them. Jesse is not too fond of the hermit crabs yet.

Cael got all dressed up for Christmas morning - this outfit only lasted for a few pictures. I couldn't make him wear it all day long. It looked a little girly.

Cael spent most of his Christmas asleep on Aunt Wendy and every other relative that wanted to snuggle with him.

Some of Cael's Firsts

Cael's 1st Trip To Church

First Time In The Swing - He didn't really care for it!

First Day To Really Be Alert For Longer Than A Few Minutes

Cael has been such an easy baby so far. He basically eats and sleeps as most babies do. He typically only wakes up once throughout the night unless he's got a dirty diaper. He doesn't really care for his baths as of yet, but we'll keep working to develop his love of water (like his big bro - Gavin). Today was the first day he really stayed awake. He has started grasping onto our fingers and I think he's starting to recognize us. He's already had his first bottle (Matt and I attended our friends' bachelorette and bachelor's parties on Friday night so Nana got to babysit). He was a pro! We are excited for Cael to celebrate his first Christmas with all of our family in a few days. He will get to meet his Uncle Curt, Aunt Amanda, Cousin Jackson, Uncle Doug, Aunt Wendy, and cousins Lucas, Bailey, Micah, and Ruth Ann for the first time. We are so excited! Pictures to follow :)

Have A Very Merry Christmas!

Cael's Birthday

I know several of you have been waiting for the details of Cael’s birth, so here it goes. I awoke on Tuesday night to take my nightly 3:00 am bath. For the last several weeks, I’ve been waking up at night because my back has been hurting so I soak in the bath and then head back to bed. Just like every night prior, I took a bath, but the back pains would not go away. I walked around the basement for 10 minutes, hoping that the back pains were just Braxton Hicks contractions and that they would go away. No such luck, I headed back to bed, turned the heat pad on high and tossed and turned for the next few hours. I got up at 5:30, knowing that my mom was getting ready to leave for work, and went and took a bath in her Jacuzzi tub. I thought maybe the jets would take away the pains in my back, they didn’t. I went back to bed and turned on a back massager and laid there until it was time to get up for work. I headed into work, calling my mom almost in tears from the pain, and decided when I got to work I would call Dr. Litherland to see if I could come in and get checked out. When I got to school, I called the doctor’s office and the nurse blew me off – until I told her that the back pains had made me sick that morning. She said she would talk to the doctor and give me a call back. She called back within a few minutes and said that Dr. Litherland wanted me to head on to the hospital. I met Matt at St. John’s around 9:30 and got checked into triage where they do several assessments to see if you’re in labor. When they checked me, I was having contractions, dilated at a 3 to 4, and 100% effaced. Needless, to say I was not getting to go home from the hospital. We had to wait in triage for a few hours because there were so many women who were in labor already and all the rooms were full. I finally got in to a room around 1 and got going on the IV. It took the nurses 5 attempts to get an IV in my arm. After the IV was in, I was quickly given an epidural and they broke my water. All this was done by 4 pm. I waited around, watched TLC, and ate popsicles until my heart’s content. Around 7:30, my nurse kicked everyone out and we did some practice pushes. After 2 sets of pushes, I had to stop and wait for the doctor. I also had to put an oxygen mask on because Cael’s heart rate was going down a little. At 8:00, Dr. Litherland arrived and I started pushing. By 8:06, Cael was born. He weighed 6 lbs 14 oz and was 21 ½ inches long. He had long, thick black hair and was very cute. Unfortunately, Cael came out with his hand up by his face and I had to have several stitches. But I am healing quite nicely and we’re all doing great.

My School Shower

I was incredibly blessed to get to have a shower at school. Cael got a lot of clothes and lots of other cute things too! I can't wait until he's here and we get to use it all!

Cael Steven Wallace - A few weeks out

At this ultrasound he weighed 5 lbs, 8 oz. They are predicting him to be an 8 lb baby!