SNOW DAY!!!!

On Dec. 20th, we got our first snow of the season.  There was always plenty of talk of snow other days, but I never get my hopes up as they are usually wrong.  So it was a very welcome surprise to wake up on this day and see about 2 inches of snow.  Sadly, this was Jason's first day back to work after Hailey was born, so he missed out on the fun and Hailey's first snow picture.

A look into our cul-de-sac

The front of our house

Pretty in pink in the snow

Hailey's first snow day

My dad was quick to go out and build us a snowman, which I helped to decorate once he was finished. Cammy enjoyed all of about 10 mins of being out in the snow before she was done.  And the dogs thought it was Heaven on Earth in our backyard as they ran circles in the snow chasing snowballs that we would throw for them.

Happy for the first 10 mins

Throwing snowballs for the dogs

My dad building us a snowman

Cammy happily watching from inside the warm house

Our finished snowman!

All in all it was a fun morning before the snow finally turned to rain and melted.

Welcome Hailey Elizabeth Lumsden!!!

On Thursday, December 12, 2013, we checked in at Providence Pavilion for Women and Children for our 5:30am induction.  At this point I was 5 days late (just like her big sister Cammy was) and about 3.5cm dilated already (completely different from big sister Cammy, as I had not dilated at all with her by induction day).  

Waiting for things to get moving

By 7:30am we were hooked up to the baby monitors, got my IV put in and started the Pitocin.  By about 9:30am contractions started to become a little bit stronger and a little bit more painful.  By about noon I was feeling urges to push and sure enough in the span of an hour I had gone from 5cm to 10cm and it was go time!

About 30 mins of intense pushing and no epidural and our newest little daughter Hailey Elizabeth Lumsden was born at 1:15pm.  She looked just like her big sister did when she was born except for one thing...BROWN HAIR!!!  As every parent probably wonders "how can I love someone else as much as my first born?", we for sure fell in love with this baby girl just as much.

Welcome to the world Hailey!

Daddy finally getting his turn to hold his new daughter

Such a precious little girl

By 5ish that same day our parents came over to meet their newest granddaughter and big sister Cammy was finally able to meet her "sissy" that we have talked about for the past 9 months.  It was such a great feeling to have our new family of 4 all together in one room!

Gramps with his newest granddaughter

Grams with her newest granddaughter

G-ma and her two granddaughters

The Lumsden girls

Cammy learning how to hold her sister

Our new family of FOUR!

Later that evening we had a few of our friends stop by to meet Hailey...

Nick holding Hailey

Lindsey finally getting to snuggle little Hailey

Jami meeting Hailey for the first time

And a short 24 hours later we were discharged from the hospital and sent on our way home to begin our new life adventure as a family of FOUR!!!

Waiting for our discharge paperwork

All dressed and ready to go home!!!

It might be a new kind of crazy in our house, but we wouldn't have it any other way!!!

Cammy loves to hold her "sissy"

Naptime snuggles

(don't worry...I only put Hailey in there as I was waking Cammy up)

Cammy wanted to be just like her little sister :)

Santa Claus is Coming to Town!

Even with the frigid temps we have been having AND a stubborn little baby that is staying put in mommy's nice warm belly (I suppose you could say we have a smart one on our hands here), we still managed to get out of the house this year to go to the Santa Parade in the Mill Creek Town Center.

Cammy really seemed to enjoy herself this year seeing all the fun things in the parade and doing all the fun activities afterwards.  A little cold weather never stopped this family from having some fun!!!!

Waiting with friends, Lindsey, Jami and Carli for the parade to begin

Apparently there was something far more exciting to see than taking a picture

SANTA CLAUS!!!!

"Is it really all over?"

Frosting a cookie with daddy

Hitching a ride with her friend Carli

A little train ride with mommy

Checking out the live reindeer with daddy

Here's to another year of fun Christmas traditions!!!

The Great Christmas Tree Hunt

I had a few requests before this baby made her arrival...

1. Cut down a Christmas tree as a family

2. Decorate tree

3. Decorate house for Christmas

Jason, being the amazing husband that he is, saw a golden opportunity to cut down a Christmas tree since it was a sunny day on Nov. 30th, so I was not about to turn him down!!  Once again we headed back to our favorite tree farm, Farmer Brown's Tree Farm.  

Being 9 months pregnant and always needing to pee AND having a toddler who only got a short nap in the car and loses interest quickly made for a record breaking trip this year.  But I am very pleased with the tree we found in the quick time we were there!! 

I was just happy that we were successful at checking something off my "before baby is here" list!!

Yes, she had fun for the first ten mins or so....

then she just kept asking to go home

The girls searching for a tree

Cammy wanted to cut down this little gem

Cammy and her grandpa Scott

Our beautiful tree

The master cutter downer himself!

Thankful to have these two guys to carry the tree to the car this year!

A Thanksgiving for the Books...

Thanksgiving this year was definitely one that we will look back on and laugh about one day. Thankful to have both sets of our parents here for it though and Jason's aunt Faith!!!  We wouldn't want it any other way. And without all of their help, we might have been eating Mac n' Cheese for Thanksgiving dinner.

Everyone doing their part in the kitchen

Carving up the turkey

Jason and I decided to host Thanksgiving this year with the unknown of when baby #2 might want to make her appearance.  We definitely didn't want to be far from home.  Everyone said we were crazy, but I in fact thought we were smart because the parents pretty much did all the cooking for us (thanks Carol, Keith, Scott and Glenda) while I was told to sit and do nothing (easier said than done for me though).

The food was bought a few days before Thanksgiving and of course a day or so after, our fridge decided to stop working and would not stay cool.  Having this happen at 9 months pregnant caused just a minor freak out on my behalf.  So all the food got transferred to Jason's parent's condo until we could get it fixed.  Of course with the holidays nobody could come check on the fridge until after the holiday weekend, so we just made due with what we had...a non working fridge and freezer and tried to focus on what we were thankful for this year.

Of course right as dinner was ready to serve we notice water all over the kitchen floor.  Sure enough with the freezer not staying cold the ice was all melting...melting into a nice little pond in the kitchen!!!  Darn it that it wasn't MY water breaking all over the floor (seemed like a good time to get out of the house).  Dinner got put on hold until the water mess was cleaned up.

The dad's being super helpers cleaning up the water leak

Surprised I didn't stress myself into labor this day?  Me too!!!  And you can only guess what we did on Black Friday...fridge shopping!

Happy Thanksgiving from our growing family!!!