We can't help it...

...We make the cutest kids in the world!!!

Claire Abigail Lindsay at 3 months

1...2...3EEEEEEE!!!!

Evelyn is hilarious - that's all I have to say! There are two things that have become a bed-time tradition at our house. One is to build a tent with blankets between the couch and a kitchen chair and the tent has to have a back door so that Evelyn can go in the front and out the back door while running in a circle around it only to go in and out again and again and again and again!! And every time she gets to the front door (blanket) of the tent she knocks on it and daddy (who is sitting under the blankets inside the tent) says "come in" and she high pitch giggles and runs in, but doesn't stay in, she goes straight out the back door to do it all over again.

The other is to be thrown in the air as high as possible while she counts us off..."1...2...3"...and then we throw her. She loves it and it's a great way to get her really, really tired!!! All this fun goes on for about an hour every single night!!!!!!!! I managed to get some great shots of this with her hair flying all over the place! LOVE IT!

Sisters

I just had to post these pictures of the girls! I think they are so beautiful!

Wiiiiiiiiiiiii

On Sunday, Gordon's parents stopped by our house and they ended up staying for dinner and dessert and games. We got out the Wii and bowled. It was hilarious!! Turns out - they are quite the competition!!! We had them create their own Mii character so that they can come back and play with us again using their own characters! We had a blast and they totally skunked Gordon!!! Go Mom and Dad!!!

House Pics

Random Updates

I haven't posted in a while so this is a well desrved UPDATE of what's been going on with us lately. We did move and our house is great!! We are so giddy about every little nook and cranny! It's great to have a home again. We thought it was perfect the way it was, but we've already started a long list of "house projects" that we want to do...someday!! It's going to be fun to paint and decorate and make this really feel like home for us.
Evelyn is master of the domaine. She runs around like she owns the place! She loves her room and everyone elses room too! I am glad that she is not afraid of the dark, because her favorite thing to do here is go in a closet with the lights out and close the door. The bad thing about that is that she can close doors, but she can't open them. One time it took me a while to find where she was...she had gone into my closet and sat down behind a rack of clothes and waited - silently- for me to find her. Since she wasn't crying or yelling for me I had no idea where she was!! When I finally found her, I turned the light on and she jumped up from her hiding spot and yelled "TA-DAAA"! When it gets quiet in the house, you can bet she's in a closet somewhere waiting to be found!
Three months is coming quicker than I expected with Claire. I can't believe she is growing so fast and she gets cuter every day! I pulled out Evelyn's growth charts when she was a baby to compare them with Claire's and Claire is already about 11 lbs at 2 and a half months...Evelyn didn't even hit 10 lbs until she was 3 months old!! Claire is such a good little eater and sleeper. Claire has been building her night time sleep hours and lately she has been going about 9-10 hours of sleep through the night, but last night was 11 hours! I have been blessed with good sleepers!!
Here are some random pictures taken since Christmas - ENJOY!

In Colorado over Christmas break we took some pictures and then our batteries died...but we took some cute ones with the cousins. My grandma got all her Great grandkids a cabbage patch doll for Christmas, so we took a picture of all the kids with their dolls - too funny!

Here are some cute pictures of Claire and Evelyn. Evelyn LOVES her baby sister!!

Home Sweet Home

We are homeowners again! We moved into our house and have been here for a week now. The night that we signed papers we loaded up our bed, Evelyn's crib, the TV and packed some clothes and food for the next day and we got our new house key and we camped out for the first time in our new house! We couldn't wait for the official "move-in" day 3 days later. Evelyn has had no problem whatsoever adjusting to the new place. She runs all over, goes up and down the stairs, plays in her room, plays in my bathroom ... she is loving the new house.
Slowly but surely the boxes are being emptied and I am finding a home for everything we own. It's funny to me though, because I don't know where anything goes!! The kitchen was the first thing to get done and then the girls rooms - thanks to some helping hands!! My girls have more clothes than Oprah!
I have been so swamped that I haven't remembered to take pictures, so I don't have any to post tonight. I will make sure to take some tomorrow and get some pictures posted.
If you need our information to keep in touch - email me and let me know at jamiemlindsay@gmail.com

We're home!

We had a great Christmas with my family - even though we had to sacrifice a deer to get there. We arrived on Christmas day and after our very eventful morning we were excited to just get to the house, sit and relax and enjoy Christmas day with the family. The girls got spoiled by loving grandparents and great grandparents with presents and lots of love!! It's a good thing I spared some extra luggage room for the trip home!
Our vacation gets better though...We took pictures, played games, ate lots of good food, we made Ginger Bread Houses, we went bowling, we caught a mouse in the house (very funny story)...we took Claire to the emergency room...YEP! You read that correctly - Claire spiked a fever of 102 and since the threshold for infants is 100.4 - we were a little nervous and decided to take her to the ER in Colorado. The whole week, Claire had been going down hill. She had a cough, stuffed/running nose and eye boogers and then came the fever and since the fever kept going up we took her in. She had blood drawn, a urine test and a chest X-Ray. The results of all the tests were negative for whatever could have been wrong, but to help keep her hydrated, they gave her an IV for fluids. On the last night we were there, she was finally able to sleep through the night without going into a coughing frenzy.
Evelyn on the other hand - was a super star. Her antibiotic really took effect and she was back to her normal self a day after we arrived! She was having so much fun playing with her cousins and getting some quality time with her Grandma and Paco (grandpa).
As fun and eventful as our Christmas vacation was...we will never forget this year. Lets recap our adventure - It all started with Evelyn getting Pneumonia, we hit a deer damaging our family vehicle, mommy gets sick with an ear infection and sinus infection, Gordon gets a bloody nose due to cabin pressure, we all suffer ear pain on the plane with cabin pressure, we take Claire to the ER while we are out of state and not sure if our insurance will cover it...I am just glad we didn't lose our luggage at the rate we were going! Yes, this Christmas will always be remembered!!
Today, we are home and laundry is almost done. My girls are regaining their health and strength. I am just as miserably sick as before I left and have another DR appointment tomorrow morning. Gordon is trying to maintain his health and fighting a head cold, but we are all so excited because tomorrow we close on our house!! We will soon be homeowners again and we can't wait. We are packing up the room tonight and tomorrow we get the keys to our new house! We're having a slumber party!!!

So this is Christmas...

Let me just start by saying, "AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"


Ok, now I feel better. I just have to write down the events that occurred today in our attempt to make it home for Christmas. I don't know how we survived the day, but the Lord was with us the WHOLE time!!


It all started at 5:00am this morning. The alarm was going off and I was fighting the strong urge to ignore it and fall back asleep, but we had a plane to catch so I had to get up and going. From my previous post you will remember that we are trying to recouperate from Evelyn having Pneumonia and an ear infection and myself having a serious sinus infection and ear infection as well...so you can imagine the amount of sleep we are all going on since last Thursday!! Anyways, we get everyone ready and loaded in the car and my father-in-law drove us in our van to the airport.

We were on the main stretch of highway before the airport terminals and we see 2 deer jump across the road right in front of us and we all say "Man, that was close!!" Then about a second later another deer jumped out in front our moving vehicle that was going 45 mph and WHAM SMACK HIT POW CABOOM...we hit the deer. It jolted the van pretty good and scared Evelyn into tears, but thankfully we are all ok and we didn't spin out or anything. The deer, however, we watched it helicopter away across the other side of the road and into the ditch. There was nothing we could have done to avoid hitting it because it came out of no where.

When we pulled up into the terminal, we got out and our jaws just dropped at how much damage was done to the van from a little ol' deer! It was covered in deer hair/fur and it was crunched and the headlight was broken and the hood was smashed and dented in and it was smoking. OH DEAR! (no pun intended). Well, we had a flight to catch so calling the police or my insurance agent was not a priority at the moment - we were just praying that my father-n-law would be able to drive it home safely - which he did. So we hit a deer - that is just the beginning...

...We board our flight - on time - and we had smooth sailing for about an hour. Evelyn was watching her favorite movie, Mary Poppins, on the DVD player and then she started to squirm in her seat. I thought she was just being silly so I ignore her. Well, she gets more and more fidgety so I pick her up to put her back in her seat and she is soaking wet! She is on an antibiotic that has a side effect of diahreah - yuck! She wet through her pants and onto her silky - not good! So I change her and thankfully (I was proud of myself that I packed an extra outfit for her) and we are good to go, right? Wrong...as the pilot begins to bring the plane down the altitude change was so strong that instantly ALL of our ears were in extreme pain. Since Evelyn and I both have ear infections, it was extremly painful and she imediatly goes into an unconsolable fit. So my ears are ready to explode in my head and I am struggling with Evelyn who is flailing and whailing and screaming and kicking and scratching and...doing everything in her power to be put down and I am doing everything in my power to contain her since we are landing and we have to stay confined and belted in our seats!!

For those of you who have traveled by plane, you know that when a plane begins to desend it doesn't take 5 minutes or 10 minutes or 15 minutes...it's a gradual desent over about 25-30 minutes!! So imagine this struggle for that long. Not to mention that Gordon and I had to be seperated by an isle because the plane doesn't have enough oxygen masks for ticketed passengers and infants in laps. So Gordon is across the isle from me and as I look to him for encouragement or help during this struggle -even though he is holding Claire and I know he really can't help me - I look to him and low and behold he's got a bloody nose and he is trying to stop his nose from bleeding all over the place while holding Claire!!! Could this morning get any worse???

I had to just laugh. We hit a deer, our van is broken, Evelyn messes her outfit and blanket on the plane, our ears are bursting from the pressure and Gordon has a nose bleed. Really? Really.

We finally land in Denver and were greeted by anxious grandparents who are so excited to have us and we are SO excited to finally start enjoying Christmas with our family!



phew!

Christmas Vacation....OR NOT!!

Last Thursday Evelyn got sick in the car - throw up sick! YUCK! It was totally out of the blue and right after she threw up she was fine ... running around and playing and laughing. So I think she is fine and dandy - WRONG!!! She threw up again Friday morning in MY bed. I usually bring her in bed with me to snuggle before we actually get up for the day, so we were snuggling and she felt warm and feverish, but I didn't think anything of it. Then she threw up all over my down comforter and down pillows and sheets and it soaked through to the mattress! GROSS!

So I call her pediatritian and get an appointment first thing Friday morning. The Dr checked her out and listened to her lungs and looked in her ears and did all that fun stuff and the Dr decided she just had a tummy virus and gave me instruction to keep fluids in her and make sure she gets lots of rest.

Well, the rest of the weekend turned into a nightmare! Evelyn kept getting sicker and sicker! She became unconsolable - which is not like her, we can normally calm her down by holding her and comforting her - but not this time. She would just cry and be miserable and she would want to be held and then when we would try to hold her she would change her mind and didn't want us to touch her. It was pretty hard to try to take care of her and sad that she was so pathetically sick.

She started to cough and have a major runny nose and her fever never went away. All weekend long we were calling the after hours nurse for help and advice on what we can give our little girl who isn't 2 years old yet and barely weighs 22 lbs. so none of the cold medicine or anything can be given to her. We were told to give her Motrin and Tylenol every 3 hours rotating between the two drugs. Well, Sunday night came and she threw up yet again and her cough and fever were just as bad!

We made another appointment to see the pediatritian on Monday and we saw a different Dr who when checking her said that Evelyn has Pneumonia with an ear infection, a fever and a tummy bug! WHAT?!

It's four days until Christmas and not to mention we were supposed to be traveling to Denver to have Christmas at home with my family this year on TUESDAY!! We had a tough decision to make. We were set on still traveling Tuesday morning until Evelyn threw up yet again on Monday night. We could torture Evelyn through airports and long plane rides while she is deathly ill or cancel the trip and stay at home for her to recover...we decided to delay our trip. We have rescheduled our flight to leave Christmas Day morning - assuming Evelyn improves.

Today she FINALLY broke her fever - sort of, she is still a little warm - but better. She ate some scraps of a sandwich for lunch and she nibbled on some food off our plates for dinner. She was almost happy this evening and we saw glimpses of our funny little girl so we know she is on the mend. We hope and pray that she is better by Christmas day so that we can travel home for Christmas.

PS...
I am now sick too.

Work Humor...

Gordon was sent a Christmas package at work from one of his suppliers today and he called me about it and I thought it was the funniest thing so I have to post about it...

His supplier gave him a bag of marshmellows with a note attached that read:

Santa checked his list and then checked it twice,
He found out that you haven’t been very nice.
Since coal is so expensive here is the scoop,
This year you’re getting
Snowman poop!

Merry Christmas!

Santa

We went to our Ward Christmas party and we had a special visitor in a red suit - Santa Clause! Evelyn was cheering for him along with ALL of the other children and we got in line to sit on Santa's lap. Unfortunately, when it was Evelyn's turn she went from happy and excited to the death grip on daddy and was not happy to see Santa so up close and personal. So we empravised...daddy sat on Santa's lap and Evelyn sat on daddy's lap.

I AM SO EXCITED I PEED MY PANTS!!

I just got word from the hubby that we are set to close on the house December 31st! That's like in 20 days! We will be with my family in Denver for Christmas for a week and then when we get back...it's moving time!!!! I can't tell you how excited we are to move into our new house! We are definitely having a party to celebrate!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1 Month Old

I am a week late posting these, but here is Claire at 1 month. During the little photo session she managed to "cooo" and give me a smile! We love her!

House Pictures!!

We went to our house on Sunday and it is looking fabulous! The landscaping is finished and it looks great - we are very pleased! We took pictures of the outside and the inside. Enjoy the slide show!

Paco comes to town!

My dad's work has him traveling to the east coast often which is a treat for us since we don't live near each other. He recently came to town for one night and he treated us to dinner and then we went back to his hotel room where he wrestled with Evelyn on the hotel bed and snuggled with Claire. It is so fun to see Evelyn play with her grandpa. Evelyn is learning so many new words...she can say "Grwamma" - for Grandma, but for some reason when says Grandpa, it comes out "Paco". Here's some pics of Evelyn and Claire with their Paco.

Lindsay Family of Elves

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Family Pictures

We had EVERYONE on the Lindsay side of the family home for Thanksgiving! Who knows when the next time will be when we are all together again - so we took a big family picture. We all dressed up in sports attire and jerseys and team shirts and mom and dad wore referee shirts - since that's what they have been doing for the last 40 years...ref-ing their 8 children! We made the picture totally fun and casual and then ended with the WAVE.

Hide and Seek

We have discovered that Evelyn likes to take things from where they belong and hide them somewhere else in the house. For example, my tweezers - they have been missing for several days now and I have been baffled as to where I placed them. I always keep them in my make up bag and when I needed them this week, they weren't there. In the midst of looking for them, I did find an old cell phone hiding in a mason jar box, I found about 5 of Evelyn's shirts and socks stuffed in the trash can in her room and mine, and then I finally did find my tweezers (along with two hair bows and some hair clips) at the bottom of our tooth brush holder. I had to un-cork the bottom of the jar to retrieve them. I finally got my tweezers back, but I am going to be extra careful about what I leave lying around for my little theif to hide from me!!

Popcorn, Popcorn and more Popcorn

OK - it is time!! The boys can stop reading now because I am going to share my labor story. This is for my sisters who missed it. LOVE YOU!

You are probably wondering "what does popcorn have to do with Jamie's labor story?"... ha ha ha! Unfortunately, it has everything to do with it!

It all started on Thursday, October 30th. I was feeling great! In fact, that last week of October was probably my best week of the pregnancy! I was up early all week with Evelyn. We had play dates to keep us busy. I walked a lot and for some reason I was sleeping very soundly all week long without potty breaks 2-3 times a night! At dinner on Thursday night, Norm and Linda (my in-laws) decided to have a date and go to the movies. Gordon and I decided to watch a movie in our bedroom quarters as well while they were gone. We started watching Lord of the Rings (an all-time favorite) and then around 10:00pm, there was a suttle knock on our bedroom door. It was the folks back from their movie and Linda was standing there with a HUGE tub of movie popcorn.

My eyes got wide and big as I smelled the fresh salty and buttery tub of delicious popcorn! "MMMMMM, I wonder if she'll share some" I thought. Then she handed me the tub and said that since they got the large tub and it was free re-fills, they re-filled it before they left the theater so they could bring some movie popcorn home to me and Gordon! WHAT A FUN TREAT!! Of course I dove right in and started eating the yummy warm popcorn. We went back to our movie watching and I went back to my popcorn eating, and eating, and eating. Hand full after hand full I soon realized that more than half of the tub was gone! MORE THAN HALF! I came out of my popcorn tranz and looked at Gordon and I asked if he had had any...he said no! So I had eaten through that large tub of popcorn by myself?! oh my word, am I a pig!?! So he took the tub away from me and I thought to myself - I am going to pay for that later!! Then we went to bed.

Friday, October 31st - 8am the next morning, I hear Evelyn on the monitor as she wakes up and starts talking and asking to get up. I sit up and I feel some cramping in my tummy. I remembered what day it was - Halloween - and then I remembered I was pregnant and I got mad because I did NOT want to have the baby on Halloween ---- and then I remembered the popcorn and I thought - that cramping wasn't baby related!! UH-OH!!! I ran as fast as I could to the potty.... .... ......... .............. .......... I won't give details, but it was bad! A couple matches later..... ..... .......... a few more matches later!!! Hey - I said it was bad!!

Finally, I am able to get Evelyn. I take her downstairs and we start our routine of getting ready for the day. I was sitting at the table giving Evelyn her breakfast and I am visiting with Linda and I start telling her how awful I feel and that I ate too much popcorn. "well, how much did you eat?" she asks...shamefully, I tell her. She laughs at me and I sort of laugh too because, well it is rediculous how much popcorn I ate!!!

Evelyn finished breakfast and I tell her to go back upstairs with mommy so that we can get dressed. I start walking upstairs waiting for her to follow me - but then I had to book it because - you guessed it - I needed the bathroom again. Except this time, I was throwing up. Linda comes in the bathroom to comfort me and she is rubbing my back and then I hear Evelyn at the bottom of the stairs saying "Bless You. Bless You. Bless You." after every hurl. She thought I was sneezing - a little humor in the midst of my pain and agony! Stupid popcorn!!!!

I finish wretching and I had to hurry and get ready because Gordon and I had an appointment with our builder at our new house. So I had to hurry because it was time to go. Thankfully, I had invited my sister-n-law Rachel to come with us because she wanted to see the house. So I packed the diaper bag and we left for the house. Rachel should have been driving...as soon as I exit, she looks at me and I am gripping the steering wheel turning white in the face! She asks if we need to pull over...I thought about it for a second and then quickly said "YES!" and the first available spot to pull off the road came and I took it. I stepped out of the car and began throwing up again!! YUCK! It splattered every where and yes, it got on my shoes and pant legs.

I get back in the car - as a passenger this time and we finish driving to the house. Gordon looks at me and asks if I am ok - I say one word to him - POPCORN. He chuckles realizing the popcorn is coming back to haunt me and he teases me. After the house visit, we decided to go to lunch before Gordon had to go back to work. So we go to Chick-Fil-A - my favorite place - except this time, I didn't order anything but a sprite. I was sipping away and then decided that taking a little bite of a waffle fry wouldn't hurt. Besides, I had to eat something since I didn't keep breakfast down. I nibble a little corner of a waffle fry and take another sip of sprite to wash it down - bad idea. I start getting that queezy feeling and breaking out in a cold sweat. I tell Gordon that I need to go outside and get some fresh air. He said ok, but stay where I can see you. So I go outside and I was standing at the corner of the building where all of the drive thru cars are coming out. Then I started getting that feeling so I book it across the street, trying to make it to this tree I was eyeing, but I didn't get that far. I made it to the parking lot and I had to stop between two cars and bend over and out it all came again! More popcorn!!! More YUCK on my shoes and pants!

Gordon decides it would be best if he just cam home for the day - good idea honey! So Rachel drives me back home and Gordon was following. I climbed into bed and I slept for about 4 hours! Hoping that I slept it off - but then a different cramping feeling started! I thought, well all that business in the bathroom and all that throwing up that I did all day I wouldn't be suprised if I go into labore, but it better happen after midnight! No Halloween babies for me!!

Well sure enough, that popcorn put me into labor. I started having contractions around 6:00pm Halloween night. They kept on coming all night long. Then around 4am I started timing them because they felt like they were right after another. For a whole hour, they were 4-5 minutes apart. So at 5:00am I woke up Gordon and said it was time to go. We got to the hospital around 6:00am...I had to wait my turn for the epidural, but I finally got it around 7:00am...I started pushing around 7:40am and Claire was born at 8:07am! PHEW!

Did my epidural have time to kick in? NOT REALLY! Thank goodness for a very fast labor and delivery. Thank goodness I didn't go into labor on Halloween. Thank goodness I didn't give birth to a popcorn kernal - considering how much popcorn I ate the night before! I will NEVER look at popcorn the same way again!

Little Claire

ISN'T SHE BEAUTIFUL!

Mi Casa!

Here's a house update: It's beautiful. The drive way has been paved. The dry wall is up and painted. The cabinets go in before Thanksgiving. The floors go in the week after Thanksgiving. The landscaping is being planned. We are so excited!!!!

Picture Tag

RULES: Go to the fifth folder and post the fifth picture.

This is a picture of Evelyn and Jacob. Jacob is a little boy I used to watch last summer. His mom is a great friend of mine that I met when we first moved to Carolina. What cute babies we have!!!!!!!

I tag Jennifer, Jill and Janelle.

Two kids = BUSY!

I AM ALIVE!!! Shame on me for not posting!! I have tried though - for the last 20 days I have attempted to post something new...but every attempt ended with a baby crying for a feeding, someone needed a diaper change, Evelyn re-booting the computer because her busy fingers kept pushing the buttons...etc!! I am determined to finally get this post finished without interruption!!

Claire is beautiful and is changing everyday. We blessed Claire a week after she was born because my parents were in town and we wanted Grandpa to stand in the circle. My mom has stayed with us for the last 2 weeks and she left this morning - boohoooo! So, today was my first day officially alone as a new mommy of two! I got up, I fed the girls, I showered, I got ready for the day...and all this was done before 10am! Not bad for my first day alone. I didn't realize (until today) how BUSY Evelyn is. That child is into everything! She is a great big sister and loves to be mommy's helper with the baby.

There are more pictures and more to tell - some of you are dying to know the labor story - but I'll save that for another day. Enjoy the pics!

The above picture is Claire in the hospital - 2 days old.

Day 3 - Going home!!!

Sunday, November 9th - Blessing Day

Claire in her blessing dress - BEAUTIFUL!

Daddy, Momm, Evelyn and Claire - family of FOUR!

Grandpa and Grandma Meador with Claire

Big sister!

Claire Abigail Lindsay

Our little girl finally decided to join our family! Claire Abigail was born Saturday, November 1st at 8:07am. She weighed in at 6 lbs 5 oz and 20 inches long. She is healthy and beautiful and we are amazed at how much our capacity to love another little person has increased.

Here are some pictures to hold you over before the flood of pictures that I will soon be posting!!