he's growing too fast

taking pictures of a baby is fun. why? they're great subjects. they're cute and they hold still. so much easier to get a shot with a baby as opposed to a running toddler that purposefully hides her face when you so desperately want her to look at you.



tanner has now discovered that there is an easier way to deal with tummy time. that's my boy. finding the easy way out. really though, his neck muscles are getting strong, so i'll let him slack off every once and a while.

two things i love about these pics.
1. the dino outfit. boy clothes are pretty darn cute.
2. katelyn's foot in the corner of my photos. she would not move her foot no matter how hard i tried. and for some reason her foot looks hobbit-ish.



katelyn still continues to love (read smother) her brother with love. but i'll take smothering. as long as she's not trying to hurt him.

by the way, he's two months now. it's speeding by faster the second time around and i don't want it to.

thanks for comin'

lucky us. tyler and i had more visits from family. tyler's parents flew out to wisconsin at the end of october. they had a pretty good excuse to come and visit too now that they've got two grandkids here. i know they miss those kiddos like crazy, so it's always fun when they can get some time off to see katelyn and now tanner.

it was a laid back kind of visit, and it was perfect. while they were here we ran errands with and without the kids (tyler and i had a hot date to the grocery store thanks to lori), we went trick-or-treating, went out to eat to celebrate darren's birthday, blessed tanner and hung out and talked. i should add too that i got to take some awesome naps and sleep in because they were always happy to take the kids. it was wonderful.




katelyn is in love with her grandpa and has him wrapped around her little finger. grandpa is the one who will spend hours upstairs playing in her room with her when everyone else is busy, and she loves it. i know i have a picture of katelyn with her grandma and grandpa, but i couldn't find it anywhere, so this will have to do.



it was nice to have some family here when we blessed tanner. the blessing was wonderful.



tyler's mom made this gorgeous quilt for tanner! we love it and wanted to show it off. it fits perfectly in his room. she also made his bumpers and crib skirt. what a talented mother-in-law.

halloween fun

does anyone else feel like october flew by? i had all of these great plans for the month, but the medical college had plans of their own. most of october for tyler was spent studying, so we had to cram in most of our halloween activities the last week and half of october.

last year we missed out on the tradition of carving a pumpkin, but this year i couldn't do it again. now that katelyn is a little older and can "help" out with this kind of thing, i wanted her to experience it for herself.



katelyn had her head in the pumpkin pretty much the whole time watching tyler work.



the finished product. when we were done we put some candles inside and put the newly carved pumpkin on our front porch. apparenty a 2 year old doesn't understand that part of carving pumpkins because she insisted that the pumpkin did not belong on the porch and that we needed to bring it back inside.

we were able to participate in the annual trick-or-treating at the medical college again this year. i must admit, we are being completely spoiled getting to trick-or-treat this way. we get to trick-or-treat inside away from the cold weather, the stops for candy are close together, all of our friends are there as well, and the kids get tons of candy.



our little pumpkin



katelyn the witchy witch.

katelyn was a huge fan of trick-or treating. she kept telling us, "i probably need some more candy," and "i think i forgot some more candy." lucky for us she has already forgotten about her stash that we hid away.

growing up, my mom started a fun tradition on halloween. she always prepared a halloween dinner for us. the first year she just made up some bean with bacon soup and put plastic spiders in our bowls. then she started putting the soup in pumpkin bowls. but since then, it has become so much more. i'm pretty sure now that we are all adults we get more excited about our halloween dinner than we did when we were kids. probably because we love to find and make new creepy cuisine every year.

the whole meal. we had a ton of food, but it was all delicious. and yes, we are still eating out of pumpkin bowls. yum.



brainy watermelon. tyler and i found that it is actually more difficult to carve a brain than we thought.



bloody mummy fingers



cobweb seven layer dip



putrid punch



donut hole eyeballs



enjoying the meal. tyler's parents were here to enjoy it with us. promise i'll do a whole separate post on that later!

happy halloween

i don't care that it's blurry. i'm not deleting it

just a little update

ah, the joys of motherhood. we've all heard that one right? and you know, whoever said it first, they're right. putting all of the tiredness, the impatience (on my part), the obsessive urge to clean up the messes, and the feeling of unpredictability aside, motherhood is a joy.

i love that i get to stay home with these little faces during the day. sure, they keep me busy, busy, busy, but at the end of the day i can say it's worth it.

i attempted to find a new place for tanner to sit. i thought he would enjoy the new scenery. it must have been a little too early for this toy because he mainly just put his head to the side as if he was refusing to look at the toys.

this is tanner's look. he is often found with a binky in his mouth and a concerned look on his face. and can you see how this poor kid is suffering through some major baby acne?

as for katelyn, i am trying to do a fun little craft with her everyday. it's my attempt to spend some quality time with her plus give her something new to do besides playing with her usual toys.

this days craft was a nature crown. we began our adventure outside collecting leaves, flowers and pieces of grass. i had to monitor what katelyn collected. for some reason she was most attracted to all of the dead leaves.

after we completed the craft i decided to take some pictures of us together with her new masterpiece. don't look too close at the pictures. my mirror is extremely dirty. i did say my kids keep me busy, right? not as much time for cleaning these days.

my wonderful mother

when we had tanner my mom was able to fly in for two weeks to help us out and make the transition from one kid to two. and help us out she did. it was so wonderful to have her here. not only because she was so helpful, but also because living in wisconsin i don't get to see her as often.
while she was here she cooked our meals, did multiple loads of laundry, cleaned our house, ran our errands and most importantly she took care of and entertained katelyn the whole time! she even got up with katelyn way too early so i could sleep in.
i think the transition would have been very difficult for katelyn without my mother. she made sure that katelyn was well loved and had plenty of attention so that i could take care of and get used to the baby.
i was so sad to see my mom go. it made me wish she lived just a little closer so we could visit more often. thanks again mom. you really are a wonderful mother!
now if i could just get my dad to visit...

the labor story

before tanner came, i told him i had two stipulations for him. first stipulation: i didn't want him coming after his due date. second stipulation: i didn't want him coming in the middle of the night. my due date, september 18th came and went with no signs of tanner coming, so i was left hoping that he wouldn't come in the middle of the night. i was being selfish and thinking of myself. i really didn't want to lose all that sleep, but...
sunday evening we were going about our normal sunday activities of eating dinner, playing games, talking, etc. throughout these different activities i began to feel some light contractions. i let tyler and my mom know that i was having contractions, but told them (and myself as well) not to get their hopes up. i knew tyler was really hoping the baby would come that night or even the next morning. if the baby came within that time period then tyler could compeletly miss his test he had the next mornig without having to make it up. but the contractions weren't that bad and were spaced far apart. with katelyn once the first contraction hit, they didn't stop, so i was expecting that same experience again. bedtime came and i was still having regular contractions that were still far apart, so i told tyler that i might be waking him later on in the night. i was able to get a couple hours of sleep before i was woken up by a really painful contraction. i decided to go downstairs to see what would happen. it got to the point where the contractions were getting more painful and were close enough for me that i wanted to get to the hospital. i went back upstairs and woke tyler up and had him call the hospital to see if they would take me. my contractions were not 3-5 minutes apart at that point, so i wasn't sure if they would let me come. the hospital said that because it was my second child, i could come and they would get me all set up, so off we went. we got to the hospital at about 4:00 a.m.
the hospital was great. they got me a wheelchair as soon as i walked in, put me right in a room with a very nice nurse and checked me out to see how dilated i was. i was between a 3-4, so they said i would definitely be staying and asked when i wanted my epidural. i don't consider myself a baby, but i'm not in love with painful contractions, so i said that i wanted my epidural as soon as possible. i think i waited an hour before he was able to come. i felt like i was handling the contractions well, but was very relieved that he was there. as soon as he hooked me up the medicine started working. it was wonderful! i can't say enough how much i love epidurals.
i slept for a little bit, relaxed and watched t.v., talked with tyler and my nurses and waited for my doctor to show up. my doctor was just finishing up at another hospital, so she was able to drive right over to help deliver tanner. dr. janz checked me and said i was at a 7, then broke my water, checked me again and said i was at a 9 and ready to push. when she broke my water meconium came out with it, so they paged nurses from the nicu. my room was full of about 10 people all waiting for our baby to come.
when it was time to push, i pushed for two contractions and little tanner was there at 9:26 a.m.! it was a wonderful moment experiencing that again. both tyler and i felt the spirit when tanner arrived. we couldn't help but get emotional seeing this little person for the first time. he was such a sweet, handsome spirit right from the start.
the nicu nurses took him and cleaned him out. he cried and cried the whole time and didn't stop! we joked that this wasn't a good sign. eventually he calmed down and we were able to hold him. it was so neat to hold a newborn again. so sweet and innocent and ready to be taken care of.
we spent the next two days in the hopsital. i was very anxious this time to get home. i was ready to be in my own house with my family. i especially wanted to get home to see katelyn. i missed her tremendously while i was in the hospital.
now we are home with tanner and are enjoying (mostly) every minute.