Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Baseball With Dad

There is nothing that the boys love more than playing with their dad outside.And this time it took place in the form of some good ole' catch.I have to be honest though. It is kind of scary to be on the receiving end when Benny is throwing.
Tab... well Tab is just a goober.But at least he is a goober whose aim is getting better and can catch the ball.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Huricane Irene...Perfect Time to do some Canning.

In late August, Hurricane Irene hit the area that we live in. As we had previously had issues with lesser storms putting water in our basements, Jason took what little time he had at home to prepare for the storm. He built barricades of a sort to channel the water away from the foundation of the house.It totally looks trashy but it was only temporary until he could really fix it. And let me tell you it worked beautifully. Good job,Hubby!He also dug a little ditch that ran to our back yard that is more downhill to catch all of the water that comes from our neighbor's yard which is uphill from us. This also worked wonderfully.Prior to the news that a hurricane would be headed our way, my mom had planned to come up to help me do some canning. My sister later informed me that you are supposed to put up your stores prior to the storm and not during it. Yes, thank you, Alissa. Alas, it worked out well. We lost power and as luck would have it we were planning to do most of our canning and such outside on my mom's propane canning/camp stove. Oh, how nice it would be to have one of these.

We started with Peach Jam. Yum!It was so nice for cleanup and everything being able to do it outside. Let me tell you it is the way to go. I just hosed off my deck when we were all done.After the peach jam we made Salsa. How else do you make salsa but in a massive tub? Tab really enjoyed stirring it.Then we moved on to making Dilly Beans. Oh how I love my dilly beans.The end product!

Friday, November 18, 2011

Rainy Summer Days

We are now going to backtrack and catch up... as usual.

We had quite the rainy summer. And one particularly sunny yet rainy summer afternoon, the kids were driving me nuts. So I kicked them out to the back yard to play.I do believe they were as happy to be outside as I was to have them outside.Even if there was a bit of this.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

A New Baby!

Three weeks later...

If you don't want to hear the lovely details (I left out the icky parts)...skip to the pictures.

Tuesday evening, the 25th, I had an ultrasound appointment to make sure the amniotic fluid levels were still good and the baby was looking good since I was 3 days overdue. Everything looked good. The doctor checked me and I hadn't really changed much. I was still barely 2 cm and +2 station but had effaced to 70%. So with it looking like I may not go into labor on my own, we scheduled an induction for the following Monday morning, which happened to be Halloween, gag. Feeling crushed we headed home.

We put the kids to bed, watched some Scrubs, and went to bed. I woke having a contraction that was more intense than any I had had before. I had a few more but they weren't super close. So I decided to get up and get in the shower to see if they stopped or got worse. When I got out of the shower I decided that I was sadly headed back to bed and things seemed to have slowed down immensely. As I started to get dressed things started full force. By the time I made it back upstairs to our bedroom to let Jason know, contractions were about 2 minutes apart. I figured I still had plenty of time as my body had not been cooperating thus far. As I was getting some school clothes for the kids, as we were going to have to take them to a friends house at 5 AM, I dropped everything and yelled for Jason, and told him to hurry up and finish because I was suddenly feeling a lot of "pressure". At which point he cursed at me, I believe for not telling him just how far along in labor I was. For the record, I was really shocked. So we threw everything in the car and ran the kids two streets over to a friend's house at which point I had no time in between contractions. I have never felt so out of control when in Labor. Paisley's labor seemed almost tranquil but this seemed chaotic and I felt like I was definitely not in control. I am not a loud laborer and I was grunting and cursing at Jason to hurry the you know what up. He proceeded to drive about 90 mph to the hospital. We parked right in front, he wheeled me up and which point they told me I was dilated to 9 cm. They decided that there wasn't time for an IV, even though I was GBS positive. They wheeled the bed from triage to the delivery room (thank you for not torturing me by making me get back into the wheelchair and then onto another bed as I was trying not to push. I got into the delivery room, they broke down the bed and we had a baby a few minutes later. The thing I remember most is the Dr. laughing at me because when I was settled in the delivery room and after giving my first push, laid back onto the bed and said, "ahhhh, that felt so good to push." Seriously it was such a relief from the contractions to push.

Hobbes Emerson Crellin joined our family somewhat unexpectedly on October 26, 2011 at 5:28 AM., approximately 10-15 minutes after arriving to the hospital. He weighed in at 7 lbs. 1 oz. and 20 1/2" long. When he was first born he was the spitting image of his oldest brother. I do believe that is the first thing that I said when I held him.With Mom!Weighing in.
Meeting Dad.Hello, Tab....er...I mean Hobbes.Getting his first bath in the hospital.Lucky for us, my Mom was headed up that morning anyway, so she brought the kids over after school for a visit to meet their new brother. Thanks for everything mom! Tab was so stinking excited for this little baby to join our family. He begged me for weeks to have the baby. He just didn't get that it doesn't quite work that way.Benton was thrilled also.Though it doesn't look like it, Paisley was pretty happy to be holding her baby brother too.
Check him out. I am always amazed at just how perfect they are.I mean, look at those feet. Even stained from the footprint "stuff", they are just perfect.Here he is all dressed and ready to go home. I made his little sweater, hat and booties. He is wearing the same onsie that each of the other kids wore home from the hospital. It says, "Party in my crib, 2 AM!" Buckled up and ready to hit the road.
Home at last!
Daddy, happy to see his little boy when he got home from work.Daddy, wasn't the only one happy to see him.