Christmas preview

Caroline got a karaoke machine for Christmas and these are just a few of the videos that Karen took of her singing.
More about the great time we are having in NC after I get back to MI and have my computer.

A special visit with Santa

we saw santa!!

1 month old

So a few days ago Eric turned 1 month old!  Time is flying by and he has even started smiling when he is awake and not having gas!!  Here is a picture of him leaving hte hopital.

 And this is one of him at 1 month.

At his 1 month check up he weighed 11 lbs!!  He had gained 3 lbs 3 oz in 4 weeks.  He is also sleeping great at nights and usually sleeps 5-6 hours before waking up for the first time.  I just can't believe how great a sleeper he is already.  The other 2 certainly weren't as nice to me!  Thanks Eric!

Glory

Glory is the name Caroline and Will gave to our elf.  Yes we have our very own elf!  We have the book Elf on the shelf, and so our elf showed up on Thanksgiving day.  If yiou haven't heard of Elf on the Shelf you should check it out.  The idea is you have this elf that comes to your house and then at night it reports back to Santa about your behavior and the next day is in a new hiding spot.  There is a book that explains the rules about the elf and what he is there for.  So far so good, Will comes downstairs every morning excited to find where the elf is hiding.  And their behavior has been pretty good too.

So I started this blog on Monday and I am finally getting a chance to get back to it!  The week has been a good one and the baby is sleeping pretty good most nights.  I surely can't complain, he is the best sleeping most easy going baby I have had!

But Glory is a HUGE hit around our house and recommend if you have kids to need an Elf.  Will even asked if the elf could see him at the grocery store after he pushed his sister.  OF COURSE the elf saw that! HE behaved much better after that.  So I am pretty sure I am going to need somebody to come up with a year round elf!

Justin's mom has arrived for the week and Justin and I are headed out in the morning to get all our Christmas shopping done.  Grandma will be keeping the big kids and Eric will go with Justin and I.  I will be like a mini vacation for us.  We will return Sunday afternoon so we can get ready for the week.

Thanksgiving

Susan and Graham came to Warren for Thanksgiving this year.  We have spent 4 out of 5 Thanksgivings together, which is so much fun!  We have been in NY and MD and now MI for our Thanksgiving celebrations.  

Susan and her kitchen helpers.

Graham helping as well.

Thanking God that his Aunt Susan is here!

Love!

We had wonderful food and great company yesterday.  The only think missing was the Macy's day parade which didn't show here on our NBC channel!

Thanks for coming to visit and help Susan and Graham!  We love you guys!

Grandparents visit

Thanks so much for coming and all the wonderful food and help you provided!  Can't wait to see you again in a few weeks.

My First Bath

The other night Justin and the kids go the opportunity to give Eric his first bath.  He did not like it not one little bit!  He WAILED from the moment his little hinney hit the water until he was dressed.  Caroline and Will covered their ears.  They don't like it when Eric cries and thank goodness he isn't a crier.

Justin had great helpers when they weren't covering their ears.

Exercising my lungs!

Check out the color of my hair!

All that crying wore him out and he slept pretty good after that bath!

One week old (yesterday)

So I had every intention to do this yesterday but it just didn't happen!  Eric is now a week old.  THe week has been better than I ever expected it to be (just one issue, but more in another post about that).  Justin is home helping until next Thursday!  It has been wonderful and even though I am feeling very good and like I could cook and do things I told Justin I'm just not going to.  I'm going to milk this for a little while longer since I won't have an excuse like this ever again!!  So I have enjoyed my week of relaxing and cuddling with my new baby.  I even got a new vacuum out of the deal after Justin vacuumed and realized it wasn't a very good vacuum!

After a week I can say that Eric is a content, easy going, cute as a button little fella.  I can't complain at all about his sleeping (he sleeps a lot) and most times it is in 4-5 hour chunks.  CAroline and Will are doing pretty good at adjusting as well.  Caroline wants to feed, hold, burp as much as she can and is really a great helper.  Will doesn't have much interest in holding him but will give him a kiss and so far has been really gentle.

Story time the other night.   Our bed is quickly getting small!

Here are some pictures that Justin took right after Eric was born.

After I fedd him the first time he slept for 8 straight hours!!  

Hi everyone!

First time holding him.

Welcome Eric

As you can tell by the new family picture on the blog baby Eric finally made his arrival!!

 Eric Riis (pronounced reese, it's Justin's mom's maiden name) Redfern born Friday Nov. 5 weighed 7lbs 13 oz and was 20 inches long!!
Thursday morning felt like any other morning and I was busy getting breakfast and lunches made.  Will and I dropped Caroline off at school and then I dropped Will off.  I went to the commissary and did the grocery shopping.  I came home and took the dog for a walk around the block before going to pick up Will.  Will and I had lunch and i think took a nap (don't remember now!).  Then we went to get Caroline and it was when we were picking her up that I had a "real" contraction not a braxton-hicks.  We walked the dog again and I fixed dinner.  I had another real contraction at dinner.  I didn't have another contraction until the kids bedtime which was about an hour and a half after dinner.  I had maybe 2 more contractions before we went to bed at 1030.  After that they started coming every hour then by 12 every 15 minutes and starting at 1 every 5 minutes.  I wasn't able to fall asleep but at 125 am I woke Justin up saying the contractions are every 5 minutes but I don't want to go yet.  He insisted that we go since it would take Todd (who was coming to watch the kids) 20 minutes to get to our house and then another 20 to get to the hospital.  So while we were waiting for Todd to get here and between contractions I packed Caroline's lunch for school.
We got to the hospital at 2:10 am.  I had a contraction just as we were parking and then again when we got in the hospital after walking around to the ER entrance and then again once we were upstairs.  I refused a wheelchair since I knew walking would hopefully speed things up.  We got signed in and they put the monitors on me and checked me out.  I was dilated to 5cm and got to stay.  The doctor wanted them to break my water and then things moved pretty quick.  I was having severe back labor this time (didn't with the other 2) and it was awful.  I did get some pain medicine in my IV but no epidural.  Every time the doctor checked me I was farther along.  Then i had to push.  I pushed during 3 contractions, maybe 7 minutes the nurse later told me, and Eric made his appearance!  So we got to the hospital at 210 and he was born at 535.  Not too bad and he was by far easier than Will but not as easy as Caroline.

I'm going home!!  We only spent 1 night at the hospital.

My babies!  They love him so.

Welcome to our family Eric!  We love you so very much!

Halloween

Saturday Justin and I had fun carving our pumpkins.  He cleaned them out and then I got to carve Caroline's pumpkin.  Caroline doesn't like the smell of pumpkin guts and it would actually make her gag!!

Jesse from Toy Story and Obi Wan from Star  Wars.  He was going to be Yoda but had a slight change of mind while getting dressed.

Our pumpkins.  I had a pattern to follow and Justin tried to make Yoda free-hand.  Not to shabby on his part!

Taylor Swift

Friday Caroline had a presentation to make at school.  It was a book report assignment for the 3rd graders in her class but the 1st and 2nd graders could also pick a person and present 3 facts.  It was optional for the younger kids and Caroline chose to do a report.  So last week we went to the library to get a book about Sacagwea.  Then Sunday morning she announced at breakfast that she wanted to do her report on Taylor Swift.  I was not really shocked since she really likes her songs, but surprised that she had changed her mind.  She gave the argument that she already had the blonde hair so it would work.  So Thursday night she and Justin worked on finding facts at the Barnes & Nobles.  So for school Friday you got to dress as your character if you were doing a report.  She learned that Taylor Swift's favorite color is pink (Caroline's too!) and was fine not wearing a sparkly dress that Swift is known for wearing for her performances.  

Taylor has wavy/curly hair so we had to curl her hair.

The pink sparkly shirt with a  sparkly heart on the front, sparkles on the back pockets of her jeans, a pink sparkly belt, and pink cowboy boots completed the Taylor look!  The button on her shirt says "hi, I'm Taylor Swift."

Her teacher said she did very well on her presentation.  Most kids they couldn't hear but the teacher said they were able to hear her.  Justin and I were proud that she wanted to do the report, thought about who she wanted to do, and then presented in front of her class so well.

Way to go Caroline!  You did a great job as Taylor Swift.

Learning to ride a bike

Caroline has reached a big milestone today.  She rode a bike without training wheels for the first time!!  She has been practicing her balancing using a balance bike.  It is a bike that doesn't have a chain or pedals. You can see how it is done in the video.  She had a big bike but it was so big that her feet couldn't touch the ground when she was siting on the seat.  So we decided after mastering the balance bike she needed a smaller bike so she could feel comfortable riding without training wheels.  So she got one for her birthday.  With the super busy day we had yesterday there wasn't any time to try out the bike.  So this afternoon it was.  She was excited to give it a try and off she went down the sidewalk no problem!  It was so great to see how easily she did the transition to a big girl bike.

Here is a video of her on the balance bike.


And here is a video of her on her big girl bike!



So proud of you Caroline!!

Birthday Surprises

Yesterday was Caroline's 6th birthday!!  I can't believe I have a 6 year old.  She started out her morning opening presents before breakfast.  Then it was off to school and her daisy girl scout meeting after that.  She got to take special snacks for both her class and daisy troop.  

 After we picked her up from daisys we got on the highway to head to the airport.  Justin and I had been keeping a secret.  The flight we were going to meet was running late so we stopped about 10 minutes from the airport at a Barnes and Nobles.  We ended up staying at that store for about and hour and a half!  One of Justin and my favorite things to do is go hang out at a book store and it was fun to share that with the kids.  Even though I spent the entire time in the kids section reading books to Will!  Caroline and Justin worked on finding a book about Taylor Swift for her biography report she had to do.  Then it was off to the airport.  When we were driving up to the terminal Caroline asked what we were doing at the airport.  Justin told her we had to get a bag.  (worked for the moment since he had just been on a trip)  He even asked her if she had a spare change of undies in her book bag.  We pull up at the passenger pick-up and Justin takes the kids inside to go to the bathroom.  Then he finds the right baggage claim goround thing and they wait.  Well the carousel starts moving and the kids want to know what bag they should be helping look for.  justin the quick thinking he is tells them a yellow one since there probably won't be a yellow bag and they can keep looking until they surprise comes out.  Well all of a sudden someone comes up behind them and asks, "are you looking for a bag?"  Will blows the guy off with a wave of his hand and didn't even turn around.  The guy asks again and Caroline turns around thinking she might recognize the voice and then the screams started.  Papa and Nana were standing right behind them!!  They had no idea they were coming and and the bag trick worked!  Caroline thought that was a pretty cool birthday surprise!  Then off to dinner and then home for cake and one more present.

I'm so glad she had such a great birthday and we were able to pull off the surprise of Nana and Papa coming in for the weekend.

Happy Birthday sweet Caroline!  You are such an amazing little girl and we love watching you grow up.  You bless our lives everyday with your wonderful smile.  We love you so very much.

We love Grandparents!

This group of pictures is from back in August.  They are from the weekend dad flew Dennis and Ingrid up for Justin's promotion.  I just love them too because the kids had a blast having 3 out of 6 grandparents at one time!  We had gone out to eat and then gotten ice cream.  Will was having fun going back and forth between Granddaddy and Grandpa.  

Take a picture of me! (He wasn't eating ice cream, they filled a cone with gummy bears for him)

Watching the TV behind me.

Will didn't want either granddaddy or grandpa very far from him at anytime.

Making matching faces

Ran back across to do the same to granddaddy

Ready for a ride with Grandma!

I remember spending so much time with my grandparents and Justin and I really wanted that for our kids too.  The hard part is we live so far away.  It is so nice that our kids love spending time with all their grandparents and ask for them on a regular basis.  We would all love to live closer to the grandparents but the iChat thing is really neat and the kids enjoy that between visits!