A Whole Lotta Pics!

After a few days in the hospital, we were definatly ready to come home! Here are some pictures of Jemma. I thought I'd better be quick about posting them since Heather threatened my life if I didn't.

As you can see I decked her out with all pink stuff, just so we didn't have any gender confusion. In the hospital I kept calling her a him. I guess I'm just a creature of habit.

The moment we got her home, Michelle slapped some bows on her head to take pictures. I think that's what I'm going to have the hardest time with. The boys are very low maintenance, with girls you actually have to do something with their hair, I don't even do with my own hair.

I'm so glad she's FINALLY here! The part I'm most excited about, I think, is that I can actually bend over now. Yea!!!! Well, yeah, and the fact that she arrived safe and sound, I'm pretty happy about that also.



I didn't make it home for Jacksen's B-day, so we celebrated the day after. My mom and Michelle raced around and found him a cake and decorated it with one of his favorite animals, dinosaurs.
In the picture below Jacks is roaring at the dinosaurs on the cake. He likes them so much that he played with the toys for a while before he even touched the cake and ice cream.
Jacks got a riding horse for his birthday. His other favorite animal. When he lifted the blanket to see his present, my mom asked what he was going to do with it. Before he could answer, Bennett excitedly exclaimed, "Share it!"
Matt handed him a cowboy hat that Jacks kept taking off and waving in the air and saying "Yee-haw cowboy" Sort of, we're still working on the understanding his gibberish stage.

I think this year Jacks had a good birthday, thanks a good deal to Mom and Michelle for doing all the running around. Thanks you guys for coming down and helping out. The boys were so happy to have you here. You did so much for us, and we really appreciated not having to worry about what was going on at home with the boys because we knew you had all the madness under control.

Happy Birthday Jacksen!

While I'm at it I think I will post a picture of Jacksen playing outside on Tuesday. It has been close to 60 for the past few days and we enjoyed some time outside playing. Today Jacksen turns 2! Since the doctors want to keep Ashlee and Jemma for another day we will do our celebrating tomorrow but I wanted to post a picture today!

Jemma Julianne has Arrived!

This is Michelle. I have hijacked Ashlee's blog to post some pictures and info on Jemma. Ashlee and Matt went to the hospital at 7pm on Tuesday night. The plan was for them to get Ashlee going on antibiotics and then start pitocin to get the ball rolling but when they arrived Ashlee was in labor on her own. Jemma came at 4:30am on February 4th. She weighed 6 lbs 10 oz and is 19 inches long. Both Ashlee and Jemma are doing well.

Scary Picture

Since my mother and sisters are sadistic and enjoy seeing me get bigger and bigger (and more uncomfortable) by the minute, I gave in and took this lovely self-portrait for them. Don't let the smile fool you. I was really grimacing inside. By the way do you know how hard it is to take your own picture when you have to set the timer and run across the room? (Almost impossible for a pregnant lady)

Matt's Officer Training Course

Matt left me home all alone the past 2 weeks, fending for myself while he had a "dreadful" time at Officer Training. At least he said it was the longest 2 weeks of his life. I'll let you decide after viewing the pictures.

Officer Training was in Leesburg, Virginia which is about 45 minutes west of Washington D.C. On the weekend, he and some friends went over. He didn't take many pictures. Just the close up, glamour shot at the train station.

Here he is at the Smithsonian in the dinosaur exibits.

This is a picture of them at the Capital building. He's in the back up on the balcony in the black while the rest of his group is standing below, all in black. They were watching the changing of the guards.

And can you believe they couldn't decide on the winner of a game so they had a dance off. The top picture is of Matt on the left of the line clapping.

You can imagine my extreme pleasure in seeing this picture. I guess he thought the sprinkler move is still the rage in dance moves.

He did have a little class time inbetween all the fun. Here he is doing CPR on a baby dummy.

Matt also volunteered to be on flag duty. Every morning and every night he would raise and lower the flag. Eagle scouts really did come in handy for him. Matt's at the middle post.

This is a pic of them marching to the flag pole.

This was the squad he was placed with while at training.

Here he is getting his pins put on. I think this man is the Admiral who came to speak at their course graduation.

And last, but not least. For your viewing pleasure. Here is Matt doing the can-can with his squad. It's a wonder on the things you need to learn in order to be an officer in the military.

As you can see it was all work and no play. I felt really bad for him when he called and said he was so bord. All he had to do in the evenings was watch football or sleep. Boo-hoo. I felt even worse for him when he came home and wanted to take a nap, because he was just-so-tired! But me, being the absolute mean wife, didn't let him. Instead I made sure the kids were hyped up on sugar, then locked myself in the room and took a nice long nap myself.

Christmas

No one ever has called me a procrastinator, so I suppose it's time to get my act together and finally display our Christmas pics.
Matt and I were so excited about Bennett's Santa present. He has been really big into camping and wanting us to constantly build him forts with blankets. We thought a tent complete with a tunnel to a tee-pee would be the ticket.

Bennett walked out of his room Christmas morning, point to the tent exclaiming "I can't like that!" What a stinker!!! Matt and I just stared at him. I think at one point I even threatened him that he would like it or else. He must have caught my point, because soon there after he was enjoying it throughly.

Jacks was in bliss with all the ride on toys that were availiable to him. He received a Diego trike from Santa. Then a dump truck/ride on from Uncle Bill and Aunt Robin. They also gave Bennett this nice red motorcycle that Jacks would not allow him to play with. He went from bike to bike and was in absoulute heaven. That is until someone else dared to try and ride something.




My Chirstmas present came a couple days early. I was such a good girl this year and was rewarded with 2 feet of snow. I had forgot to write Santa a letter to explain exactly what I wanted, but somehow he figured it out.

Stitches were what the doctor ordered, after he saw the gash with oozing blood on Bennett's lip.

Monday afternoon Bennett and Jacks were playing "camping" with their blankets on the dinning room chairs.
Bennett was piling blankets on the chair then dangling his legs and arms on opposite sides. Finally he decided that was all the fun he could handle and slowly slid off the chair with blankets clutched in his arms. It looked very comical until he grabbed his mouth and started crying. I walked over, pulled his hand away, and almost passed out. I called Matt to tell him we were headed down to the hospital to get stitches. He thought I was overreacting, until he saw Bennett for himself.
As they prepared Bennett for a shot to knock him out, he was wondering if he was there to get his Ethan out of his tummy. The sad thing about that statement is he is convinced he has a baby in his tummy that is going to come out. He has named him after his favorite cousin, Ethan. I keep trying to tell him that only mommy has a baby in her tummy, but he won't listen.
They knocked him out and gave him 4 stitches. I accidently looked and got very dizzy and woozy. I had to sit down quickly unless I wanted to make a spectical out of myself by passing out. Matt just rolled his eyes, he thinks I'm weak. The meds were suppose to ware off in 10 to 20 minutes, unfortunately it was nap time so he slept for about another hour. Jacks also took a nap. He was reclined in his stroller that was resting on my legs. I even thought about laying my head down and taking a nap.
Finally we were able to wake him up enough for him to take a sip of juice and walk (I mean wobble)around the room.

Yesterday he woke up from him nap and threw up all over me. He wasn't able to keep anything down for the rest of the night, so I'm not sure if he is just really sensitive to the drug or if he now has the flu. Either way it has been very quiet around the house the past couple of days.
Last night all he wanted to do was take a bath. So we kept filling the tub up with hot water, he would stay in for about 5 minutes. Then 30 minutes later would want another bath. I'll have to take him to get his stitches out by Saturday, but they look like they are healing very well, probably because he hasn't been talking much.

Sledding

Yesterday we went sledding. Can you believe that! Arizona is such a disappointment to me. I came here looking for sun and warmth and what do I get? A big fat snow storm.
But sledding was fun. We went up to Sunrise where the ski hill is and found a little hill for the boys to go on. Unfortunetly there was so much powder that the sled didn't sled very well. Also, it was so cold and the wind was blowing, but that didn't stop the boys. They had a blast.

Since the sled didn't go very well Matt decided to pull the boys behind the Trailblazer. I know, we're brilliant parents. But we did it safely - I promise. And the boys enjoyed it (that's all that matters, right?)
(It doesn't look they they are having that much fun in the above picture. But I promise - they were. This must have been taken in between smiling and laughing)

Jacks most favorite part was laying down and enjoying a snack. He's not to hard to please.

Evil Squirrels

The squirrels here FREAK me out. Doesn't it look evil? It is! This place is infested with them! When I first moved here, one ran out in front of my car. I wasn't sure what it was at first, a fox maybe? I didn't know. They are surprisingly big. A little while later I had an unfortunate encouter with one. I was in the car and it was sitting on a fence post, but it surely looked as if it could come right through the window with no problem since it was nashing its razor sharp teeth at me. Don't think about looking them in the eye. Their eyes are red and beady. They stare back at you as if you could be their next meal or like the would enjoy attacking you just for the sport of it. A shiver runs down my spine everytime I encounter one.

Disclaimer!

Okay, so HB and I had a little disagreement on the whole which twin is it issue. There is a picture of Grace, Felicity, and Ethan. HB says that Felicity is by Ethans left hand and Grace is by Ethans right hand. That is true. She is looking at it from the prospective of Ethan. But when I wrote that Grace is on the left and Felicity is on the right, I was looking at it through the eyes of the viewer.
Wow! I'm glad I cleared that up.
Plus, Michelle - I do know that I labeled Grace as being in most of the slideshow pictures when some were Felicity. First of all, the pictures were really small and I couldn't see their faces when I downloaded them. Second, Grace is just much faster to type.
There! Are you two happy now?!