Pub Crawl & Christmas Tree

This weekend we went on our second annual pub crawl with our friends. This year we rented two party buses to take us to the bars, which turned out to be a great idea. I sort of wish we spent more time on the buses than in the bars. I unfortunately didn't take many pictures and these two were the only pictures I ended up with:

Ryan and I had a great time hanging out with our friends sans kids. I'm surprised we were able to stay out as late as we did!

Today we went and got our Christmas tree and put up our Christmas decorations. Isla did a wonderful job in helping me decorate the tree and the house:

Drew just hung out in his Christmas sweater looking cute and staring at the tree:

Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving this year we packed up the kids and traveled over to Bellingham to see my parents. We had all kinds of weather while we were there - sun, rain and snow. On Thanksgiving day we woke up to this outside:

and then three days later this was our view:

I seriously can't get enough of this view. We had a great time hanging out with the family - Drew even got to meet his namesake - cousin Drew:

And Isla got to hang out with some of her favorite people - Aunt Anna, Krista, and GiGi:

The only sad part of the weekend was watching Boise State lose to Nevada. I don't think Ryan will get over that loss for a long time. The loss didn't seem to upset Drew that much though - he is one smiley kid:

Big Boy

Well it's official - Ryan and I have big babies. They don't necessarily start out big (both were 6 lbs 11 oz at birth), but they pack on the pounds once they are born. Drew had his two month appointment yesterday and he weighed in at a whopping 13 lbs 5 oz. That is a full 2 lbs heavier than his sister at this age. That put him in the 90th percentile for weight and his height was 23.5 inches which put him in the 75th percentile. Since his birth he has doubled in weight (with most of it going to his cheeks as evidenced in the picture above) and grown 4 inches - that's a lot in only 8 weeks! He is now smiling a lot more and even smiled at his sister last night, which brought tears to my eyes. He has been such a good baby and has brought so much joy to our family - we love you baby Drew!

Halloween Pics

Here are some pictures of my cutie pies (and aunt Anna - yes you are cute too, Anna!) dressed up in their Halloween garb. Miss Isla was a witch and Drew was a skeleton - you can see that Drew is already in awe of his big sister:
We decided not to do the traditional trick-or-treating with Isla this year - maybe next year. Instead we did a Halloween House Crawl with our friends and kiddos. I unfortunately don't have any pictures, but Isla had a lot of fun and even took a couple of swings at a pinata at one of the houses. I think the sugar may have had something to do with that!

Spoiled

For the past six weeks Ryan and I have been spoiled. We have had a live in nanny, cook, house cleaner, personal shopper all in the form of my Mom, GrandmaGiGi. Since the day after Drew was born, my Mom has been living with us and helping us getting adjusted to a family of four. I fully believe that she is the reason that I have not yet “lost it” since Drew has been born. When Isla finally realized that Drew was here to stay and became jealous, GiGi was there to help dry her tears when I could not. When Drew was fussy and I could not sooth him, GiGi was always there to take over and help me maintain my sanity. When I needed someone to talk to about motherhood, GiGi was there to listen and not judge.

Thanks to GiGi Ryan was also able to go to all of the Boise State home football games, continue his weekly happy hour “meetings” with friends, and play in all of his flag football games. Thanks to GiGi I was also able to get out for a couple of happy hour “meetings” myself.

Our beloved GiGi left us yesterday to return to her life in Bellingham. So far things have been going okay (and I know everything will be just FINE), but I do think that I may “lose it” sometime this week. But I will have my husband here to help pick up the pieces and we will adjust to being a family of four.

I would love to say thank you to my Mom for all that she has done, but thank you does not even come close to conveying how thankful I am. I am so lucky to have you as a Mom and hope that I am at least half the mom you are to my kids. We love you.

GrandmaGiGi playing in the leaves with Isla

Toddler Bed

We are in the process of transitioning Isla from her crib to a "big girl bed". Since I'm not ready to put Isla in a room downstairs all by herself, she and Drew will be sharing a room for a little while. We plan on moving Drew into the bedroom in about a month so we decided to move Isla to her toddler bed now in order for this to happen.

Our little Isla moves a lot while she is asleep so it was no surprise to me when we found her on the floor asleep on her first night in her "big girl bed". For the past week we have been putting her in the bed and each night it seems we have to go into her room and pick her up off of the floor and put her back in the bed. The other night when I went to check on her this is what I found:

She was out cold in this position and I had to leave the room because I was laughing so hard. After I composed myself I went back in and put her back in her "big girl bed". I'm hoping she will eventually learn how to stay put during the night, but until then I don't mind checking on her a couple times a night (since I'm up feeding Drew anyways).

Linder Farms with Papa

Papa came to visit this weekend and he got to experience Linder Farms with the family. I was so excited to take Isla this year as she is big enough to go on some of the rides. Of course Drew decided he wanted to eat when we got there so I spent the first half of the morning in the car feeding him while Isla went on a pony ride, pet the animals, and went on a wagon ride (ah life with a three week old!). Thankfully I got to go with the family on the hay ride out to get our pumpkins. Here are some pictures from our day:

Isla at the petting zoo:

Isla riding the pony. She had a much better experience this time around (the first pony ride at the fair didn't go so well) and really enjoyed herself:

Enjoying the wagon ride:

On our way to get the pumpkins:

Drew enjoyed the ride as well:Claiming our pumpkins:

While Papa was here he also got some bonding time in with his grandson:

Drew Update

It has been over 3 weeks since Drew has been born and time is flying by. Our boy has been doing great and growing a ton. We went to the doctor today and he weighed in at 8lbs 8 oz - almost 2 lbs more than his birth weight! Needless to say he is a great eater. He does have a little cold and a clogged tear duct, but is otherwise very healthy . I only have to get up with him about twice a night and he usually gives me anywhere from 2 to 3 hour stretches of sleep. Here are some updated pictures of our sweet baby boy:

Big Sister

Many people have been asking how Isla has handled being a big sister and I have to say that so far she has been handling it very well. She really isn’t into holding Drew, but she always wants to know where he is. She loves to give him hugs and hates to hear him cry. She does the cutest thing when she hears him crying – she cocks her head to the side and says “oh, baby brother”. I caught it on video last night while we were changing Drew’s diaper (he absolutely HATES to have his diaper changed):

The other night while I was breast feeding Drew, Isla asked me what I was doing and I said "I'm feeding baby brother". She then proceeded to tell everyone that Drew was eating Mommy's shirt. It cracked me up, but I guess that is what it looked like to her.

I think Isla will be a great big sister. We will probably run into some jealousy issues down the line, but so far so good!

Mr. Potato Head by Isla

She put this one together all by herself:

Happy 2nd Birthday Isla!

I felt a little guilty for not planning a big birthday party for Isla’s second birthday, but I think I knew I would either have a brand new baby or be really really pregnant and not be in the mood or capable of hosting a party. Thank goodness we have the best family in the world that came together and was able to throw an amazing birthday party for Isla the day after we brought Drew home from the hospital. Isla had an absolute blast and really enjoyed being the center of attention. And the presents (oh the presents!) were an absolute hit – she loved each and every one of them!

Isla enjoying her birthday morning doughnut from Papa:

Seeing her present (table and chairs) from Grandma and Papa Randy:

Going for a ride in her car from Mom & Dad:

Playing with her new kitchen from Aunt Anna:

Her kitchen accessories from GiGi and Papa:

Playing with her puzzles from Uncle Johnny and Aunt Brandy:

Blowing out her candles with Dad: She really enjoyed her cupcake:

Happy Birthday to my sweet baby Isla!

Drew Thomas Skene

I think deep down I knew this baby was going to come early like his sister. So I wasn’t surprised when I woke up on Friday morning, September 17th, at exactly 12:00 am to discover that my water had broke. My water broke with Isla, but I was already in labor when it did and really didn’t notice it at all. In fact, I was sort of concerned that I might not notice it again if it were to happen with baby #2. Yeah, no worries there – I definitely noticed it this time. So I woke up Ryan and told him to call his Mom so she could get over to our house asap.

As a side story – Ryan and I were somewhat concerned about not having anyone to watch Isla on Thursday night/Friday morning if I were to go into labor since our roomie, Krista, was driving back to U of O that night. Lucky for us, Connie had a high school reunion in town this weekend and decided to come down a day early to help us out if we needed. We are so glad and blessed that Connie decided to do this! She saved us.

After a quick shower and making sure that everything was in order for Isla, I gave my sweet sleeping baby girl a kiss goodbye (I got all teary-eyed and everything as she had no clue as to how her life was about to change), and we got to the hospital at about a quarter to one and checked into labor and delivery. Fortunately (or unfortunately) I wasn’t having any contractions at this point so we had to have a doctor do an examination in order to make sure that my water did in fact break. Luckily the doctor took one look “down there” and declared “oh yeah her water broke”. At this point they let me walk around the hospital for an hour (in a hot hospital gown) to try and get labor started. I knew it was a lost cause, but Ryan and I walked around anyways and sent text messages to family, friends and co-workers to let them know we were going to have a baby.

At about 3:00 am they started me on pitocin and Ryan and I tried to get some rest. Not sure how I could get rest with contractions starting, but I tried anyway. At about 6:00 am I was ready for my epidural, but the nurse explained that the anesthesiologists work 24 hour shifts and there was a shift change at 7:00 am. So I could get my epidural with the doc at the end of the shift or wait an hour and get a doc with “fresh eyes”. I sucked it up and chose the latter. This last hour made me decide that an epidural is the best thing in the entire world – I love them!

After the epidural took effect (around 8:00 am) it was determined that I was at 6 cm and 80% effaced. Again Ryan and I tried to rest, but it didn’t really work as I was too anxious. At about 9:45 I paged the nurse because I had a big urge to push (something I never experienced with Isla) and we found that I was at 10 cm and ready to go. We waited about 20 minutes for the doctor and I pushed for 15 very short minutes and our baby boy was born! He came out just perfect and weighed 6 lbs 11 oz and was 19.5 inches long (the weight was the exact same as Isla – apparently I like to have babies on the third Friday in September and they have to weigh 6lbs 11 oz).

Here are pictures from Drew’s Birthday:

Little did I know that the birth was going to be the easy part of our stay at the hospital. After Drew was born we found that he had a low blood sugar level (he had a level of 34 and it needed to be above a 50). We decided to let him breast feed for a little and see if we could get it back up, but it didn’t work. So for the next 24 hours they had to prick my baby’s tiny feet with needles to test his blood sugar every 2 hours and they also shoved formula down him (so much that he was spitting up everywhere) in order to get his blood sugar back up. The whole experience was awful and I lost it a couple of times. Thank goodness his blood sugar started to go up early Saturday morning and we were discharged on Saturday evening. I was worried about giving him formula and that it might interfere with breast feeding, but so far I have not had to supplement his feedings with formula since we got home from the hospital. So far Drew has been a great baby and we feel so blessed to have our sweet healthy baby boy in our lives.

On our way home:

My new reality . . . and I love it!