High Five For Dad

A Good Idea?

It was finally time to put Audra and Claire into one bedroom. To answer your question- no, we do not think it will go well. They are sure excited about this, however. And Camille will need a crib relatively soon. At least for naps. So, we needed to put the older girls together sooner or later.

Today was the day.

Audra has been begging us for a week to move Claire's bed over. Apparently when you move beds over, you have to bring up every stuffed animal you have to celebrate:

 Yes, we know bunk beds are in order. But, we're worried about what Claire will do with bunk beds (and how many bones she will try to break) so we are holding off for awhile.

After moving Claire's bed, her room was bare. Audra exclaimed, "CLAIRE! We have a RUN AROUND ROOM!"

Maybe sometime soon we'll get that crib set up.

Portfolio

Time to update the girls portfolios. We'll start with Audra's pictures. She is really doing a good job of drawing things instead of scribbling:

 And here is Claire. She is still scribbling, but she is always so super proud of her pictures:

Claire made the above picture at church the other day. We asked her what she did at church and she said, " We went for a walk. We had to hold hands. I ran away from my teachers." She just said is all so matter-of-fact. As if running away from her teachers was just par for the course. With her it is.

A Long Week!

This week is finally over! It has been a LONG week! From the hot temperatures to the horrible news broadcasts, I am so glad this week is over!

But, today we had some fun to finish off our week. We headed to one of our favorite parks- Belleview Park- with some of our favorite people and enjoyed watching the kids splashing in the river. We didn't even do the train or the petting zoo because the kids were having so much fun in the water. At 94 degrees, I can understand why.

 WARNING: What follows is some serious cuteness! Be prepared to get all warm and fuzzy all over.

If you don't think she is about the cutest thing west of the Mississippi, then you just have no taste in cuteness!

Do you know what makes her even cuter? Last night she woke up at 4 and 7 to nurse- that's it. Dang, it is SO EASY to absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE this baby!

Picture Of the Day

The Check-Ups

Today we had check-ups for both Claire and Camille.

Camille is plumping up quite nicely. Here's her stats:

Weight: 11 lbs. 15 oz.         53%
Height: 23 inches                58%
Head: 39 cm                      59%

I have been thinking that Camille looks like a 3 or 4 month old as she has these beautiful fat rolls on her arms and thighs, but I looked up Claire's stats and she was 11 lbs. 7 oz. at two months (and she was in the 67th percentile, so I am not sure how that works). So maybe Camille isn't as pudgy as I thought.

Camille did not do well with the shots. At all. Poor girl! I hated hearing her "I'm in pain" cry- a cry that I pretty much have never heard. It broke my heart.

Claire is not plumping up at all- she is definitely our skinny Minnie. Here's her stats:

Weight: 27 lbs. 7 oz.         18%
Height:  37 inches              40%

She was very stoic for her shots- no surprise there. She was excellent for the doctor. She kept asking, "when is she going to look in my ears?" She was very excited for that for some reason.

And, for the record, Audra is at 41 lbs.

And, here's some pictures of Camille- because I can never post enough of them!

 This is Audra "decorating" Camille. She LOVES to "decorate" her. In this instance, she put an extra diaper on her and gave her Rapunzel to keep her happy.

And, I got in on the action as well. Doesn't she make a cute little gangsta?

Ode To A Decade, and A Day

This week marks one decade since I moved to CO.

I was going to write a wonderful blogpost about how my roommates and friends drove me out here, how hard the first year was but how grateful I am that I ended up here. I was going to write about all the reasons I love Colorado.

But then I saw the news this morning. Of course, I am referring to the shootings this morning- the "Batman Massacre."

And now I am not quite sure what to write.

This is the place of the gorgeous Rocky Mountains, the Broncos, and the Mile High City. But it also the state of Columbine, the Waldo Canyon Fires, and now the Batman Massacre.

Colorado has been on the front page of a lot of newspapers this summer. It has not been a good summer for us here. Today is an especially dark, dark day.

So, now what?

A favorite quote of mine is,

"A life lived in fear is a life half lived."

I have desparately tried to live my life by this quote. This quote helped land me in Berlin in 1995, in South Carolina in 1999, and in Colorado in 2002- undoubtedly some of the best choices I have ever made.

When I told my mom I was going to be teaching at the rival school of Columbine, my mom got worried and said I shouldn't move out here. I didn't give it a second thought.

Now I'm giving it a second thought.

Now I have kids who I want to keep safe and protected.

I don't want to be afraid of sending my kids to school or going to the movie theater or anywhere else for that matter.

But I want my kids to be safe.

I am reminded of when Audra was born and I started freaking out and wondering how it was Ben and I thought we could possibly raise children in this scary, scary, world.

Then Ben gave her the most beautiful baby blessing which reassured me that God is in charge, that He wins in the end, and that Audra is a super strong girl who can beat the evils in the world. Basically, I realized that my fear was driving away my faith and I shouldn't let that happen.

That is how I am feeling now. That fear is driving away faith. I hate that.

I know tomorrow will be better. That each day we will get stronger and we will get past this horrible, awful day. I know that we were- thankfully- not involved in what happened, and to our knowledge nobody we know was involved. (of course, they haven't released the names of victims so we don't know for sure)

On 9/11 I remember having a deep pit in my stomach of sheer horror, shock, pain, etc. Today that pit has returned- and I hate it.

I am saddened that this dark day tarnishes the beauty that is Colorado. This is (was?) a wonderful place to raise a family. This is (was?) a beautiful state with friendly, warm people. This is (was?) the place I was planning on being forever and raising my children. I have loved the past 10 years that I have spent here.

Today I am just not quite sure what to think.

But I'll get there- we all will.

A Cutie

Two Months!

 Can you believe two months have passed already? I can't! Yet at the same time, it seems like Camille has always been with us- she fits in so perfectly with our family.

I am absolutely LOVING having a newborn around. It's easy to love it when you have such an easy baby! Camille still sleeps for about 19 hours a day. She sleeps pretty well at night. She was waking up 3 times a night to nurse, but now she is mostly down to 2. At 2:30 and 4:30 she wakes up. And it is like clockwork- she is amazing with her own schedule. She is still sleeping with me in my bed, and probably will for at least a couple more months. It makes my life easier, and I love having her so close.

She is gaining weight beautifully- I can't get enough of her chubby arms and  thighs! They are the cutest things! People think she is 3 months or older, and I sometimes forget that she is still a newborn because of how fast she is growing.

Overall, she is very happy. She grunts instead of cries- mostly. She will cry when she wakes up hungry (which is every time she wakes up), but then I feed her and then she is the happiest thing. I can't believe I can put her in the bouncy chair or the swing and she will just sit there and watch the world around her without making a peep. I couldn't do that with my other babies because they would just cry, but it has been so nice with Camille.

I swear I heard her laugh a few days ago. She has this "game" that she plays with me. When she is finished nursing, she will pretend to latch on and then just smile and smile as if she got me good. I know it seems crazy to think that a two month old is capable of such a thing, but I swear she does it! Then, a couple days ago she was playing her "game" with me and she started laughing. It was the cutest thing. She is the cutest thing.

Here she is, though, already getting sick of me taking too many pictures of her:

 And here she is sticking her tongue out at me:

She has learned to be scared of Claire, and will often make a funny face when Claire comes near. Claire loves her baby sister, but sometimes she loves her a little too much.

I love carrying Camille around in the Moby Wrap. I LOVE having a newborn to snuggle! And, Camille loves to snuggle back.

I absolutely just love Camille. She is so sweet and precious. It has been a relatively easy adjustment to having a third baby- probably because she is so sweet. Audra and Claire "help" out and are very sweet. Claire calls her "Camille Bug" like I do, and Audra will say, "I want to see if the newborn baby is awake." The hardest part is trying to keep the older two kids entertained while I am nursing or tending to Camille, but they are doing better. Hopefully, the transition will continue to be smooth.

It is simply a joyful time. I LOVE my life!!!! I'm about to cry just thinking about how fortunate I am. I LOVE staying home with these girls and playing with them all day every day. I love it when Camille holds on tight to my index finger for dear life. I love it when she plays with me by sticking her tongue out at me or by her latching game that I described above. This is just such a wonderful time for me, and I am incredibly grateful.

I'm not sure of what else I can say. We are happy. We are complete. Life is wonderful.

Friday the 13th Curse?

 Today we got to have our first experience needing one of these:

 Before you get worried, everyone is perfectly fine and all turned out well. Now it will be a story I am sure we will laugh about in the future. But I definitely have some thank you cards to write to some firefighting heroes.

We were at the pool today- a place I go all the time with my kiddos. I was sitting on the side nursing Camille when a lady came over to me and my group of friends and said, "are any of you Christina?" I replied that I was, to which she responded that my daughter had her finger stuck and was crying.

What?!? I was totally confused.

I ran over to where she was. She did, indeed, have her finger stuck. She was in the pool along the side wall with her finger caught in one of the holes that blow air (water? What are they blowing? I don't know) into the water. She was crying and scared.

I jumped into the water (thank you to my wonderful friends who watched Claire and Camille- it meant so much to not even have to worry about my other two kiddos and to know they were in perfect hands while I handled this newfound stuck finger) and tried to assess the situation.

It was not great. Her finger was twisted at an incredibly awkward angle and there was no way it was coming out.

The lifeguards tried to help, but to no avail. They are, after all, just young kids themselves. They got some ice packs and called the fire department. They told me this happened last summer as well and the firemen had to be called for that situation as well.

They cleared the pool. Audra and I were alone in the water while everyone watched to see whether Audra would survive.

Audra cried. I tried to be very, very calm and told her the story of the 3 Little Pigs to get her mind off of her finger. I called Ben- as I was explaining the situation to him it was the only time I was afraid. I thought she may have broken her finger based on her weird angle, but I figured that was the worst it would be. I mean, what else could it be? I was certain they were not going to have to do anything too crazy, but I thought a trip to the ER might be in order for a broken finger. So I thought he should be warned in case he needed to come home and help.

The firemen came. There were about 6 of them craning their necks to try and figure out how to get this little girl out of this unusual situation.

In the end, they got her to straighten her body out so she was more aligned with the hole. Then they had her kneel down in the water- also for better alignment. One fireman convinced her to straighten out her fingers (she was scared to do any moving at all- she thought if she moved it would hurt really bad and that her finger would get cut).

Once she was aligned with her fingers straightened, the fireman easily slid her unbroken but swollen finger out of the hole.

We stood. The crowd cheered.

We thanked the wonderful firemen.

Audra got an ice pack.

Audra was still quite traumatized as we decided to just leave and not swim any longer. Miraculously, a Happy Meal and hot fudge sundae made her all better:

You can see the special fireman band-aid on her 

ornery and adventurous finger

At least two of you who read this blog have had firemen literally save your child's life. I am always awed and grateful for their ability to come and rescue people from death.

But, today I am grateful that they can also save people from the most random and strange circumstances that they may find themselves- like a 5-year-old getting her finger caught in a blow hole.

Claire's Big Day

Has it REALLY been three years? I mean seriously, wasn't it yesterday I was writing on this blog about how scared I was to have a c-section? Nope- it was THREE years ago. Wow.

We started the day by going to the park with some friends. We brought some cupcakes to share- I figured since we weren't having a Birthday party, we might as well at least have her friends sing to her while we were at the park.

I'm so glad we did. Look at Claire's face- she is exuding JOY! It was so incredibly sweet!

 She wouldn't blow out her candles, though. Audra had to do it for her.

 Later, I saw Camille holding a doll that Audra received as a gift. Claire put it there so Camille wouldn't have to sleep by herself. So cute!

 We got her a DQ ice-cream cake- pretty much a standard for our Birthdays:

 Again, do you see in her face how sweet she is? Both she and Audra are the same- they feel and exude love as they are being sung to:

 Once again, Claire wouldn't/couldn't blow out the candles, so Audra came and helped her out:

She is our independent, spunky, sassy girl. She is Audra's best friend- and Audra is hers- and she is a monkey through and through. She thinks she is indestructible, and tries tirelessly to prove it. She is about the most opinionated little girl I have ever met.

She is tough. But at the same time she has all of the qualities I want a girl to have when they are older: she doesn't put up with people's crap, she stands firm in her convictions, and she doesn't let a difficult situation stop her from achieving her goals. I really do think she has a bright future ahead of her.

Did It Work?

Can you tell what we were trying to do with this picture?

A Zoo at the Zoo

Monday is Claire's Birthday, so yesterday we let her decide what she wanted to do to celebrate. She chose the zoo, so off we went!

 Unfortunately, they were not cooperative when it came to pictures. They kept running away from the camera.

 Thankfully, at least Camille was cooperative.

 And, yes, that's a smile! She's actually been smiling for a couple of weeks, and it is so cute! She really is a very happy baby- hallelujah!

 

 Unlike last time, where the girls just wanted to see the monkeys again and again, this time they ran from animal to animal and wore themselves- and us- out. We were all tired and ready to leave after a few hours. It was a great day, but I am SOOO glad it was only in the 80's yesterday as opposed to the 105 degrees we have been having!

St. Mary's Glacier

For awhile now Ben has been wanting to go to St. Mary's Glacier. Since he has a few days off from work this week, we decided to head up and give it a shot.

Before the hike there was a little ghost town so we went and toured the houses:

 Then we started on the hike:

 I told Ben if we were going on a hike, then he had to carry the baby:

 Here you can get a slight taste of how steep the climb is. The whole way up all I could think was, "Why do Coloradans think this is fun? First, we start at 10,000 feet so we already can not breathe, and then we decide to climb another couple thousand feet in a mere 3/4 of a mile? WHY do we do this?!?"

 Well, this is why:

And, since we are really trying to win "best family photo of the millennium" here is another gem for our collection:

 I had to bribe Claire to get her to look at the camera for this picture:

 Audra begged me to let her go on this log. I put her on (she is about 3 feet in the air) and she freaked out she was so scared:

 Ben took Audra to go touch the snow on the glacier. Nobody else went except them, and apparently Audra cried the whole time because she missed her Mommy:

The girls were real troopers and did great on the hike, especially compared to our last hiking attempt. And, we stopped at Beau Jo's on the way home- what could be better? All in all, it was a great day.