Ava!!!

On Wednesday, October 12th Brandon and I went to the hospital bright and early so I could be induced and finally meet our sweet baby girl.

At first it felt like things were going to be slow. I got caught up in my journal. I didn't realize I hadn't even written in it since I found out I was pregnant.

Brandon was getting pretty bored. We should have brought books or something. But when it was finally time for things to happen, they happened fast! It was such a smooth, wonderful delivery. It only ended up being 5 hours and 15 minutes from the time they hooked me up to the IV until she was born. Not bad.

Ava was a lot bigger than we were expecting her to be. 8 lbs 9 oz!

I'm pretty sure this is the first time I have ever done skin to skin.

Brandon was so excited to feed her a bottle! I wasn't sure at this point what I wanted to do about nursing/pumping/formula feeding.

The nurse was worried about some grunting noises she was making and she ended up spending the rest of the afternoon/evening in the NICU on CPAP but was released before bedtime.

The kids waited all day and it was pretty frustrating that they couldn't meet her yet but finally they got to come and spend a few minutes with her before they went back home to bed.

This was basically the first time I felt like I had really seen my baby, like 7 hours after she was born.

Family of SIX!

As much as Tyler wanted a brother, he will be a great protector for all his sisters.

Jakers

The Friday before Ava was born I took the kids to Mckinley's school carnival. They had so much fun.

I was hoping to go to Jaker's pumpkin patch as a family for our last Saturday but Brandon had to replace the water heater in our town home and it took up the better part of the day. So Monday after school I took the kids and my mom and Kristen came as well. The kids were just as excited as if we went to Disneyland. Seriously. They love this place.

Me and my mom.

 Mckinley and Tyler thought it was sooooo funny when Kristen gave them big Santa bellies full of corn.

Very last belly shot! This was at 39 weeks exactly. She came out two days later.

We decided to take a picture of the five of us the night before Ava was born and we would become a family of 6.

Random Pics

Mckinley was "sketching" Kallie one Sunday morning. So cute!

We went and stopped by the temple after we were at my parents' house. As much as I don't like driving to their house, it's nice that we always pass the temple and the kids get to see it.

These two! They are ALWAYS together and usually playing so nicely. I love that they are best friends!

Tyler and Kallie came with me to go to lunch with Brandon one day. These pictures of them are just too cute not to post!

General Conference Saturday. This literally lasted for Elder Uchtdorf's talk (the first speaker) and then it was chaos from there on out. Most of the time we just asked them to go play downstairs so we could try to listen.

Tyler and Kallie turn 4

Our twins are growing up fast! They turned 4 on September 27th. They are so much easier now than they have been in the past (besides when they were adorable happy babies for awhile) and I just love it! They play together so well and entertain each other and are always together. It's adorably cute.

They had their 4 year well checks and did amazing. 

They each even got flu shots in their arms and didn't even cry at all. I was impressed.

The night before their birthday we got to go to Pizza Factory with all of Brandon's family and they got their number 4 pizzas.

The morning of their birthday we did all the traditional stuff. Hidden presents and mickey mouse pancakes in bed.

Their big present was a new slide.

It worked out really well that I was teaching joy school on the day of their birthday, so we kind of just turned it into a party and they had a lot of fun with their friends. We did a treasure hunt (that they lost interest in before it was over) and I let them frost and put sprinkles on their own cupcakes. They were pretty much too young for both of those activities so it ended up being a little stressful for me but it was my own fault. We still had a lot of fun.

Tyler was in love with this tool set he got!

Kristen made them some cute birthday cakes that they loved.

Then that evening we took them to play on their favorite playground at the Provo Rec Center. It ended up being a pretty simple birthday, but they had fun. Kallie kept asking me all day "is it still my birthday?" and when I would say yes she would say then what else are we doing that's fun? She is a little diva!

We sure love these two to pieces and are so excited to see them with our new baby when she arrives next week!

Salt to Saint

On September 23rd and 24th Brandon rode with his family in the Salt to Saint, a bike relay race from Salt Lake to St. George. Brandon only started riding a bike a month or two before this, but is in great shape so he did amazing. 

They had horrible rainy and cold weather, and Brandon caught the worst of it. Super bad timing. But they had a good time anyway and are already planning on doing it again next year.

I was so worried about him while he was gone, especially when I heard he crashed. He flipped over his bike and the bike landed on him. But he didn't get hurt!

This was just before his wreck.

It took them just over 24 hours to finish the race, Brandon froze to death riding at night. But they all made it home safely! They finished 5th in their division and 23rd overall out of 149 teams. Not bad!

To Remember...

Just some random pictures from September that I want to remember.

Tyler and Kallie dusting for me. This day has been a long time coming! I need to get my kids to do more chores like this.

My first time teaching Joy School was so much fun!!! I thought I would be so stressed but it was a lot of fun and really easy.

Then Tyler was teaching school to Kallie and Brandon. So cute!

His version of "R".

Brynlee and Mckinley pretty much wore the same outfit to school one day.

Kallie asleep on the chaise lounge. So adorable!

Kallie went at it again coloring on furniture. At least she will clean up her own messes!

I found this shirt that says Best Friends and it seriously looks just like Mckinley and Brynlee. Right hair color and styles, the glasses, and even the eye colors are right. Crazy!

36 weeks pregnant. And so excited to meet our little Ava girl.