Austin James

It has been crazy around our house for the last few months. We had a wonderful new addition to our family in July.

Introducing Austin James Roy

Austin made his debut appearance a week early. It was so much fun. We had decided not to find out if he was a boy or girl while I was pregnant. We had all our friends and family guessing. I think Megan was the only one who consistently said I was having a boy.

On July 21st, I had the crazy experience of having my water break at work while I just started training a customer service representative. This happened about 1:30 pm and I was not expecting this, but as soon as my water broke I had an idea that my baby was a boy. My water broke with Aiden as well, but in a grocery store. Taylor was more of a "normal" contractions.

When we got to the hospital, the nurse was so cute. She was so excited about us not knowing the sex of the baby. She made sure everyone who entered the room knew so they would not give the secret away.

Since my water had broken but I was not having contractions, I was put on pitocin to help things along. The pitocin worked very well, they expected Austin to arrive after midnight, but he was in a hurry. Around 10 pm I was feeling very uncomfortable. They thought my epidural was wearing off. Due to some complications the anesthesiologist spent the entire delivery in my room. I actually received four separate injections of the epidural to help with pain and to try and slow down the delivery. Now, my OB doctor almost did not make it in time. The on-call physician was there as well. My mom and sister arrived just after he was born, well they were running down the hall as they heard his first cry.

At 11:05 pm Austin arrived. It was such a fun experience to hear "It's a Boy!" Definitely worth the 9 months of guessing. He was a healthy 7 pounds 11 ounces and 21 inches long. Holding him for the first time was heaven, love at first sight!!

The one draw back of not know if we were having a boy or girl was deciding on a name. We had plenty of options for a boy. Here are a few we were discussing.

Austin

Dylan

Noah

Jacob

Ethan

The day we left the hospital we decided on Austin. It just felt right. His middle name is James. This is Papa Cordell's middle name and Grandpa Jim's name.

He had the cord wrapped around his neck twice. Luckily there were not complications with this. However, I had some complications with my epidural. I spent the next two weeks in bed with the most extreme headaches I have ever had. I have to look at this as a blessing in disguise. I spent two weeks in bed with Austin by my side with no other distractions. Thad was lucky enough to be able to take 2 weeks off to watch the other kids for me.

Aiden and Taylor visited Austin at the hospital the next day. They absolutely adore their little brother. I was worried Taylor might have been upset as she wanted a little sister, but she loves him so much. She never even mentioned wanting a little sister after he was born. She turned into a little mother. Both Aiden and Taylor have helped me so much. They would get me diapers and even fight over who gets to throw the dirty diaper away. I am truly blessed to have such an amazing family.

We are so excited to have Austin apart of our family. WE LOVE YOU!!!!

Soccer Star in Training.

Aiden has had a blast with soccer. He has made so many new friends and just loves learning everything he can about soccer. Every night he has Thad read about soccer rules and how to become a better soccer player. We have seen a huge improvement in the last few games.

His team is the Super Kickers. All the kids are pre-kindergarten and this is their first time playing soccer. They have played 3 games so far. I love seeing them run around after the ball, not quite sure what they are doing. However, Aiden has almost scored a couple of goals. He is working hard to get his first goal during a game.

Planning their game strategy.

Aiden practicing before his first game! He is really good at getting the ball in the goal.

Happy Birthday Taylor!!!

We have had 4 adorable little kids turning three in the last three weeks! It has been so much fun to see all of them grow up. Last Sunday Taylor turned three. We planned a Mad Hatter Tea Party for her. She had an absolutely wonderful time. Luckily the weather cooperated and we had the tea party inside but all the activities in the backyard.

We planned everything around Alice in Wonderland. We had looking glasses and crazy hats for the kids to decorate, treat bags with water that said "Drink Me" on it and cake balls with "Eat Me" signs. The best thing about a Mad Hatter Tea Party is that nothing had to match. We just had fun bright and crazy colors every where.

I have spent the last couple of weeks planning for this party. I think Thad is happy it is finally over. Every night I was showing him pictures of things we could do, enlisting his help making tissue paper pom-poms, hanging lanterns and planning the food.

I wanted everything to be perfect for my little princess. Having a little girl is so much fun. I absolutely adore Taylor and everything she does. Even though I like to tease that she has Thad wrapped around her little finger, she has me wrapped around her finger as well.

Here are some of the reasons I love Taylor:
1. She has the most adorable smile
2. She wakes up every morning happy and tells me that she loves me.
3. I just feel her love every time she gives me a hug.
4. She cares about how others feel and likes to help them and make them feel better.
5. She is very mischievous, I never know what she is going to do next. It keeps me on my toes.
6. She loves cooking and taking care of her babies. She will be the best mom every when she grows up.
7. Everything has to be princess, including me. All girls are princesses to her.
8. She loves her brother and her little baby. She even gives my tummy a kiss every night to make sure the baby doesn't feel left out.
9. She never makes a rash decision. She has to thoughtfully think through everything before deciding. This makes trips to the store to pick out a toy challenging.
10. Taylor gets so excited even over the littlest things. It makes me so happy to be her mom.

I LOVE YOU MISSY MOO!!

Here is Taylor's beautiful hair. She loves having princess hair, but only when someone else does it. Mom is not allowed to do her hair.

Here is my first attempt at a Topsy turvey birthday cake. It is much harder then I expected to cover in fondant. Next time I may just use regular icing.

Everything had to be Alice in Wonderland themed.

Saturday morning Taylor and I had a girls morning out. She went and got her hair done for her party. I made this periwinkle tutu for her to wear at the party.

I love how this turned out! Thank you Thad and Annie for helping get it all together.

We had two tables set for 16 kids to join the party. The bouncy castle, slide and trampoline were too much fun to have all the kids join the tea party at once.

The tea party place settings.

The Super Kickers

Aiden has his first soccer game tonight. He is so excited. Last Saturday we meet his coach, Emily. It was so cute to see these little 4 and 5 year olds practicing for their game. He is on the green team and their name is the Super Kickers. He has two kids from Challenger on his team. So they practice soccer everyday at recess.
Here is Aiden in his uniform. He loves it and wore it to Senika's birthday party and the next day. I had to take it off him while he slept just to wash it.

Senika's Birthday

We have four birthday parties for 3 year olds this month. Taylor has so many friends that are just her age, which is so much fun. The first party is for our good friends daughter, Senika. We love their parties, the kids have fun and all the adults hang out forever. We were there for a good 7 hours.

Aiden was tired of me taking pictures, so he gave me this funny pose. I love it!

Aiden and Taylor with their present to Senika. Taylor started crying after she found out all the presents were for Senika. She was afraid that she missed her own birthday party.

Taylor showing off all the fun things she got in the pinata. Just a note to everyone, chips in a pinata is not a good idea.Aiden hitting the pinata.

Aiden and Gage playing sword fighting with the pinata bats.

Taylor loved her fairy wings. She still wears them everyday.Happy Birthday Senika! The two princesses wearing red headbands!

Here is a fun video of Taylor dancing. She was so excited to see Senika open her birthday presents. I have never seen her dance like this before.

A Trip to the Dentist

The kids had their annual check-up at the dentist. Both kids were actually excited. I love the kids dentist office, they make it really easy.

Before we left Taylor decided she needed to look beautiful and rummaged through all my make up. Taylor loves make-up. When I get ready in the morning I will let her put some make-up on as well. I will give her a powder brush or eye shadow brush and tell her where to put it on. This time she did it all by herself and may have forgotten some of my tips. Including that the belly button does not need lipstick.

Aiden was amazing at the dentist for his cleaning. He let them take all the x-rays they needed. He did this by himself since Taylor and I left the room since I am pregnant.

The only thing that scared him was the chair moving, so he waited until the chair was laying down before jumping on it. Unfortunately he had one cavity and had to go back that afternoon to get it fixed.

Taylor had a little harder time. No x-ray's were even attempted. She did let them brush her teeth only while sitting on my lap. Luckily Taylor had no cavities. :)

Aiden was so nervous to get his cavity filled. We had a difficult time getting him to take the medicine or put the gas on. Dad finally talked him into both and the trip was super easy after that. He watched a movie and felt great the rest of the day, even played at his cousins house.

Easter Extravaganza

The kids had a pretty amazing Easter this year. First of all we made a deal with the Easter Bunny, no candy except for a little bag of Jelly Beans. We had promised Aiden he could get Jelly Beans for Easter. Taylor does not do well with candy, she usually takes one bite and then spits it out, usually in the garbage, but not always. The Easter Bunny brought Aiden new church clothes and Taylor a new princess dress. As well as Zingo a really fun bingo type game for the whole family. These were sitting on the counter as they could not fit in the Easter Basket. The baskets were hidden, which was tricky, they had to be places the kids could find them but high enough so the dogs would not get into them.

This is a picture of Aiden with his hand on fire. We played hot/cold game to help Aiden find his basket. It was tricky because it was hidden in the dishwasher with all the clean dishes. Aiden just got his first list of chores last week and one of them is to help unload the dishwasher, so it was fun to find his basket in there.

Taylor basket was hidden on top of a bookshelf. She needed Dad's help to get it down. It was so fun to see her look for her basket. This year she really understood that she was looking for a present.

Taylor is wearing her new princess dress with "High Shoes". She loves high heels and that is all she will wear.

These kids sure love each other. Aiden saw Taylor dress in the back of our car earlier this week. When Taylor was sleeping he told me that he knew the dress was from Mom and Dad. I had to explain that the Easter Bunny does not have a sleigh to carry all the presents like Santa does, so he dropped off Taylor's dress early. It was too big to carry with him when he was delivery the baskets. I think he liked that answer. He is growing up too fast. I don't want the magic of holidays to end anytime soon.

Aiden and Taylor's baskets were mostly full of fun toys, books, games and a movie for each.

Taylor was so excited about her chap stick and markers. The markers unfortunately ended up all over our living room couch and Taylor received time-out. The marker did not come out, but the other side of the couch cushion is clean.

After Easter baskets we took Thad to the airport. He is spending the week in South Carolina and Georgia attending the Masters. He was able to do this last year as well and had a great time. Aiden really want to go with him next year. We are going to miss him. Last night I had the alarm set and dogs sleeping in our bedroom. I just don't feel as comfortable without him there with us.

Easter continued at Nana's house, where there were over 250 eggs hidden throughout the house. Taylor had a lot of fun as she slowly followed the other kids picking up all the egg they ran past to get to the playroom. She found about 25 eggs that the other kids overlooked. In this case slow and patience paid off. After Aiden found his eggs he came back and helped his little sister find more. He is such a good big brother. He wants to make sure she is happy and always protects her even if he gets mad at the wrong person. With all the cousins in town this week, I was told he got mad at Grace because Taylor cries everytime she is in town. I feel really bad since it had nothing to do with Grace. She was just overwhelmed with all the kids around. However it is nice that he wanted Taylor to be happy.

After the Easter Egg hunt all the kids went outside and played tag, threw sticks in the pond and just had fun being kids. I am a nervous parent and would not take my eyes off the kids. Aiden knows how to swim, but Taylor does not yet, so the pond is scary. Especially when it was freezing and there was still snow on the ground. What happened to spring?

I wanted to do something fun with the kids for Easter. We made chocolate covered cake balls in the shape of Easter Eggs. The kids were able to decorate them with sprinkles. They are very yummy but very rich.

HAPPY EASTER EVERYONE!