Ryker Thomas:: 1 Month and 2 Months

Even though this blog has been all but neglected, I can't let my littlest kiddo grow up without tracking his monthly pictures and developments. I love being able to look back at my other kids' milestones and baby pictures. 
Ryker at 1 month:

-We had a lot of trouble nursing and required the help of a supplement tube (filled with pumped milk) to help him nurse better. He finally got back to birth weight after 3 weeks. Just like his big sister. 
-He slept a lot a first, but towards the end of the month he started being less content to sleep wherever. His favorite place to sleep is on my chest. Of course :)
-He does sleep great at night, though! Usually 1030-430 or 5.
-Wears newborn clothes and graduated to size one diapers right at 1 month old.
-He HATES his carseat and screams wherever we go. It's awful.

Ryker at 2 months:

-Nursing improved immensely. He still gets fidgety and sometimes won't stay latched for long, but he is eating so much better and gaining weight as he should.
-He's still pretty small... 9lbs14oz (3rd percentile). We just want him to stay on that tiny curve and not move down at all.
-He still hates his carseat, but we have moved the straps up/out a little and took out the infant insert. It seems to have helped a little bit. He only cries about half of the time now. Ha.
-He usually sleeps through the night! The first of my children to do that on their own! He goes to bed after Jax and Lexi, about 830, then wakes up around 5 to eat. He will doze for another hour or so until his siblings wake up and then we are all up for the day around 630. 
-He smiles and makes happy noises when we talk to him.
-He has rolled from back to belly twice, but I think it was more of an accident than anything else.
-He wears 0-3 and 3 month clothes, and size 1 diapers.

I can't believe it is the middle of November and he will be 3 months old in 2 weeks!

It's Officially Holiday Season!

I always look forward to Halloween for one big reason... once it's over, it's officially holiday season!!!  The countdown to Christmas has begun! I try not to skip over Thanksgiving, but I definitely look forward to Christmas more!
It's always around this time that I start to think about Christmas cards. First up, family pictures. Thank goodness we have a neighbor who is a professional photographer and can take awesome family pictures for us. I need to get that scheduled ASAP!
In the meantime, I have been looking around at some Christmas card ideas. I'd heard good things about Minted.com, so I decided to start there. And I found so much CUTE stuff!  I mean, look at these...   LOVE the verse on this one

And the cute writing on this one

The glitter on this one is adorable!

Love the writing and heart on this one!

I can't even decide!
There were tons of cute options for Christmas cards, plus lots of other great items... Wedding invites, wall art, birth announcements, party decor, and list goes on.  
Now I need to do our pictures so that I can get some cards ordered!  Which one would you choose?

I was given store credit to minted.com in return for this review. All opinions are my own. 

Ryker Thomas!

Our sweet boy made his appearance on August 25th at 4:04 in the afternoon!  He weighed 7lbs6oz and was 20 inches long.  We are so in love!

Here is his birth story:::
I had a very long, drawn out labor... something that I was not at all expecting! With Lexi's labor and delivery, things happened SO fast that I hardly had time to think. I was expecting (hoping!) that things would be similar this time. I was so wrong. 
On Sunday the 24th, my water started leaking around 1pm. I quickly took a shower and got ready, just in case things happened fast... I wanted to be clean! But for the next few hours, nothing happened. It was like my water hadn't even broken. Around 8 pm we decided to go ahead and head to the hospital. They got me all check in and settled into a room. I told them that I didn't want pitocin to speed things up (plus, I can only have a small amount because of having a previous c section). So the plan was to walk a lot, sit on the birth ball, stay hydrated, and monitor Ryker off and on. This continued for the next 8ish hours. And hardly anything was happening. Contractions weren't really getting stronger or closer together. I decided that starting a very slow drip of pitocin would probably be best. They checked me for the first time and I was at 4cm. We started at the lowest amount of Pitocin and slowly added more over the next few hours until things finally began to pick up. 
Sometime late in the morning (I have no idea what time...), I was having really intense contractions and my body felt like it was trying to help Ryker move down. I was having a hard time with each contraction and was really hoping that I would be almost complete/ready to push when they checked me again... but I was only at 7cm. I had planned on having a drug-free birth, but decided at this point that an epidural was the right decision. I was very disappointed that I wasn't further along, and after having no sleep and very little food, I just didn't have the energy or strength to continue without drugs. I got an epidural and had to lay down and wait for it to kick in... which was absolute torture! Having to lay on your back through super intense contractions is incredibly hard. The epidural wasn't working very well, so they added a dose of lidocain, which numbs you COMPLETELY. After a little while, I was ready to push. I tried and tried, and he did move down, but I was SO exhausted from having no sleep and very little food plus I was SO numb that I was almost falling asleep between pushes. We decided to take an hour break for me to get a quick nap. They turned the epidural off so that I could get a little less numb, but that made it impossible for me to sleep. I was emotionally DONE and I knew the only way for things to get better was to muster the strength and push him out. I prayed and prayed that God would give me strength to push. And it only took a few pushes and Ryker was born! Once his shoulders were out, I was able to grab him and pull him onto my chest myself. That is THE BEST feeling in the world!
As he was coming out, the doctor noticed that he had a fore-sac wrapped over his head. It was a tiny, secondary amniotic sac that had been in front of his head the whole time. Who knew?! That explains why my labor never really progressed how it should have and why he wasn't positioned properly to help me dilate! Ryan said it looked like he was wearing a hoodie when he came out. Ha! 
Although I am a little disappointed that my plans for a drug-free birth didn't happen, the circumstances were out of my control and I did the very best I could with the situation I was in. I am so thankful that I was able to have another successful VBAC and that both Ryker and I are happy and healthy!

 (My fantastic doula, Meghann!)

We love you so much, little guy!

Pregnancy Updates::: Weeks 24-32

As you can see below, I haven't been the best at taking weekly pictures. Overall though, I feel like you can see the belly progression and since it's my 3rd kiddo, I'm pretty proud that I've done it at all ;)

I'm 35 (almost 36!) weeks now and we are counting down the days until this sweet boy makes his appearance!!!

Lexi turns 2!

Lexi turned two on July 4th and we a red, white, and blue Minnie Mouse party!

It was a pretty small affair, but she had fun and that's what really matters!

I made her this birthday dress and was super happy with how it turned out! 

She looked adorable!

I had bought this swim suit on clearance last year and was tucking it away for this summer. I was so excited to be able to put her in it!

Horrible lighting for this picture, but I love seeing how our family has grown over the years. 

We can't wait to add baby Ryker in just a few weeks!

A few party details :)

I made homemade strawberry cupcakes with strawberry frosting, and chocolate cupcakes with root beer frosting. Both turned out yummy and the birthday girl scarfed them down! Well, mostly the frosting... which seems to be typical for my kiddos. 

 She LOVED opening presents and was so thrilled about all the princess and dress up stuff she got. She may like to play with Jax's trucks and Ninja Turtle stuff, but she is truly a girly girl!

My sweet girl gets fireworks every year for her birthday and this year was so much fun. We pooled money with our neighbors and did a big fireworks show on our street. Everyone was outside playing and watching, and it was so much fun. We are so blessed to have a wonderful neighborhood and neighbors!

Happy 2nd birthday, Lexi Nicole. 
We love you so much!

Jax turns 5!

If you haven't noticed, I haven't been blogging much ;) I don't have the time or energy to focus on it, so I'm basically just using it as a way to keep track of important events in our family. If you're reading this, thanks for sticking around!
Jax turned 5 on June 3rd, and we had a small cake and ice cream party with family and a few friends. Jax is obsessed with Ninja Turtles so all the plates, cups, etc were Ninja Turtles as were almost all of his gifts. We didn't do a big thing because we had something bigger already planned! 

For his big birthday present, we took him (without Lexi!) to Disneyland! My parents did the same thing with my brother and I when we each turned 5 and we plan on continuing the tradition with all of our kiddos. 

We went with our buddies that also turned 5 in June... and we had SO much fun! When we first got there, we checked into our hotel then headed to Downtown Disney. We went to the Lego store, which Jax was just as excited about as actual Disneyland, and then headed to Rainforest Cafe for a special birthday dinner. 

The next day we went to California Adventure. We went straight to Cars Land since that gets so busy, so fast. I couldn't ride some of the rides, but used that time to relax a bit. 

The boys all had tons of fun. 

We spent the whole day wandering around, riding rides, having snacks and treats, then had a birthday dinner at Ariel's Grotto. 

After dinner we rode a few more things, then headed over to watch World of Color. By this point, everyone was exhausted and Jax just kept asking to go back to the hotel. We've seen World of Color and few times and won't be hanging around to see it again any time soon. It's just too late after such a long day!
The next day we went to Disneyland. 

We rode a few rides then headed to Jedi Training. Jax has reentry starting loving Star Wars so he was super excited about this. He learned how to fight, then got to fight Darth Vadar! Afterward, he got a Jedi Training Certificate. He loved the whole thing!

The rest of the day was spent riding more rides and eating more yummy snacks. Jax got to ride the Matterhorn and Thunder Mountain for the first time and he loved both! We were pretty bummed when we found out that Space Mountain was closed for maintenance. He's already talking about riding it the next time we go :)

We had a great day, ate some dinner, then headed back to the hotel to swim and watch the fireworks from our balcony. We weren't about to wait around for fireworks at the park just to have the boys be too tired and want to leave. Heading back to the hotel to watch them there was the perfect solution!
The trip was great and Jax is still talking about it a month later. I loved making memories and having alone time with the boy who made me a mama. It was a great way to celebrate him before his baby brother comes in a few weeks!