Trying to keep up...

Never enough time, but here is a few flashbacks of the last couple weeks....

Hayley had her last tumbling class for the spring. She loves to show off her moves if you ever want to see them!

Kyrsten longs to be in gymnastics too one day.

Since the girls did great sleeping in their beds last month and filled up their charts, their reward was build a bear. Kyrsten was hooked on Hello Kitty and HAD to have the HSM clothes. She is obsessed! They love their new pets- Kitty and Sammy.

The girls have been playing together more and more- here they are at "a ball."
(A little out of focus)

Jace had his 1 month appt. yesterday. He officially turns 1 month tomorrow- time is flying! He weighed 10lb 8.5oz. Obviously he is eating plenty! He is doing good. Wish he would sleep more at night and get on some sort of schedule...we will get there eventually.

Adjusting

I actually have a couple minutes to sit down and try to quickly post some pictures and let you all know what we have been up to, which is adjusting. There never seems to be a dull moment around here anymore. There is always something to do! I am way behind on cleaning and daily chores, but we are doing our best to keep up. Hayley and Kyrsten love their baby brother, which means they love to get in his face, try to pick him up, squeeze him, etc. It is quite the task to keep Jace safe!
As silly as this might sound I have to give a big thanks to High School Musical. Yes, you read that right. Kyrsten is completely obsessed with all three of the HSM movies. Theses movies have helped keep the few pieces of sanity I have left. Kyrsten will watch them over and over and anytime. If I need to take a shower or want to feed Jace without two other children climbing on me, I can put in HSM and Kyrsten is in her happy place. It cracks us up. Needless to say, we have been singing and dancing HSM tunes way too much in our household.

HSM even puts Kyrsten down for naps!
When I came down stairs after feeding Jace, this is how I found her. I guess she was a little hungry too.

Jace is doing pretty good. He is adorable and we LOVE him so much! He seems to have a good day then a fussy day and we go back and forth. His sleeping the last couple nights have been downhill, along with everyone else in the family. Last night at 3am, my whole family was up and in our room. Two whining and crying toddlers, one crying hungry infant, and two extremely exhausted parents- oh so fun! Hopefully the nights will start improving soon.
To wrap it up before I bore everyone to sleep, we are doing good. Happy we have a handsome little boy in our family now! Adjusting to life with three little kids....

While I was feeding, which I do a lot of, Kyrsten came in with this fancy get up. Who doesn't want to be a fairy cowgirl cheerleader!?!

This was during his "wake time."
You can see how well that was going. Good thing he is so darn cute!

Hayley loves to hold Jace, except when he decides to poop.
He has done this twice while in her arms and even though nothing leaks out, Hayley has to change her clothes because according to her, they stink:)

Baby Jace

Our precious baby boy has arrived:

Jace Dean Mitchell
March 25, 2009
8lbs 120z
20 1/2 inches
11:42 am

Due to exhaustion and feeding time, here is the quick version:

Jace is finally here and he came on his timing! I was schedule to be induced at 5:30am on Wednesday, but instead my water broke on it's own at 3:30am that morning and we arrived at the hospital at 5am. I am very thankful I was able to go into labor on my own. Overall, everything went pretty well. Labor progressed nicely, I was able to get the epidural ( I am so thankful for modern medicine), I only had to push for 40 minutes (compared to 2 hours with Hayley) and I delivered one healthy little boy! Babies are miracles! We are so happy to have Jace in our family now! He has a head full of brown hair just like Kyrsten, but seems to have many facial features that Hayley had as a baby. So far he eats well like most little boys. The nights and days seemed to be mixed up. We will be working on that. The girls are overly excited to have a little brother and LOVE to hold him. We all do! I have to give a huge THANK YOU to our family. Both sides of our family our helping out so much- thank you-thank you- we love you all! And of course a thanks to our great friends who are already calling, bring by food, and offering help. We appreciate you all.
Enjoy the pics:

Busy weekend

At one point this weekend my house was filled with 8 girls! (Poor Jeff). On Friday afternoon, my mom and younger sister came over to visit. They had planned on being here more often last week, thinking we would have a baby, but since that wasn't happening they come over hang out. Then Friday evening, my older sister and her two little girls, came over to hang out too and spend the night. We had a fun filled girls night! The little girls had a blast playing with their cousins, staying up late, getting up early and playing more! After watching the four little girls play, I was wondering if Jace is procrastinating his arrival due to the fact he will be surrounded by so many girls:) It was a fun weekend though and glad I got to spend some time with my family prebaby time. Thanks for coming everyone!

This is the girls an hour after their cousins left- exhausted from all the fun! I wish I would have taken pictures while they were here!

Jeff wasn't tortured too much from all the girls, since he locked himself in Jace's room to finish painting it. Jeff's brother Jason came down last Thursday and helped Jeff get the nursery painting started- thanks Jason! Jeff was able to finish it up by Saturday night. I love it! I think he did an awesome job- especially painting a room for the first time. Thanks babe!

Last, but not least, today is my official due date and as you can tell, we have no new baby yet. You never know how things will turn out. Soooooo, I am now set up to be induced tomorrow morning at 5:30 am. I am so excited. To each her own, but I am physically and emotionally ready to have this baby and meet our baby boy! Hopefully by this weekend will be able to post some pictures and info. Baby Time!!!!

Baby Jace Update

I am not sure if anyone cares, but if you are like me and stock peoples blogs, I thought I would write a little update about our dear little baby boy who is snug and happy in my belly! I really never thought he would still be in there at this point. My technical due date is not tell the 24th, but I started with a different due (3/16) in the beginning and made the mistake of thinking of that as my due date. I had two due dates with Kyrsten too. My first due date with her was 9/30 then they moved it back to 10/5 and she came 9/26- four days before the first one, and she came out 8lbs 14oz! So, since this is my third, I just thought he would be early like Kyrsten. My mistake. Now that I am close to my actually due date, I feel like I am over a week! I learned my lesson.
Anyway, the last two weeks I have been dilated to a 3. My doctor was surprised to see me this week, thinking I would have gone in last week. I have another appt. next Tuesday. If I make it to that one, I get to set up an appt. to be induced. I am hoping he will come before than, but am starting to feel like maybe not. So far many of the natural labor inducing techniques are not working. Today I decided to give up and just wait it out. In reality he will be here before I know it. This week would have been most convenient, but what can you do? Hopefully the next post will be a baby announcement!

The Cactus Pedal Challenge

This morning Jeff was able to participate in The Casa Grande Cactus Pedal Challenge. It was a 27 1/2 mile bike race and he came in 9th place!!! He felt like he didn't didn't race smart by starting to fast, but we think he did great and now he will know for future races. I am not even sure I could ride a bike slowly for 27 miles. GOOD JOB JEFF!

Jeff leaving the house for the race.

The beginning of the race!

The girls waiting for their Daddy.

Finish Line!!!

Now, if we could just get our baby boy to race on out, I would be even happier!

Much needed update

Alright, it is time to sit down and do an update. I have been wanting to, but by the end of the day I am usually exhausted and swollen, so the little things get neglected. Today has been fabulous because Jeff was off. I had help with the kids in the morning, was able to rest in the afternoon, and now have time to blog while Jeff is at the park with the girls. So nice! Okay, where to begin....



First, I have to proudly announce some major accomplishments that have happened in the Mitchell home. We'll start with Hayley. Since Hayley was about 5 or 6 months old, she has been a thumb sucker. She had her blankie and her thumb. Last month we made up a "Stop sucking my thumb chart" for Hayley and her reward if she stopped was a new bike that she could pick out. I am sooooo proud to say, Hayley has completely stopped sucking her thumb!!!! Kids are amazing. What will power she had to give up something she has been doing all her life in one month. By the first week of February Hayley had her new Barbie bike she wanted. The beginning was hard for her. She had to learn how to fall asleep and calm down when upset without the blankie or thumb, but she has done it and is doing awesome. Good Job Hayley!!
She of course wants a new matching helmet, since the princess helmet one does not go- so this month she is working on staying in her bed all night instead of coming and sleeping on our floor half way through. Interesting enough, she has struggled with this more, but made major improvements this week. Another week or two of staying in bed and she might just have that new helmet!



Now Miss Kyrsten. Kyrsten pretty much decided in the month of January to be a big girl and use the potty. I started potty training with her last October. She picked it up, but then completely regressed. After the move and the holidays she started showing interest again and doing it all by herself. We went with it and now she is potty trained!!! That is how it is with our Kiki. When she decides, it will happen. She has the occasional accident, but is doing great and has now being staying dry at night too. (Hopefully, I didn't just curse ourselves). Kyrsten also had a reward chart and decided on a computer. I talked her into the extremely affordable toy register that can also be called a computer to a 2 year old:) This month Kyrsten is also working on sleeping in her bed. Kyrsten has had some major sleep issues- like fighting for over an hour to go to sleep and coming in our bed every night. We finally had to fight the battle. She is going to bed now with much less fight, if any and has been either sleeping in her bed or some nights she sleeps for a few hours on our floor, but she is out of our bed!!!! Even though I can't sleep right now, it has been awesome with my own space! It is amazing to see how much better sleep Kyrsten gets in her own bed and how much happier she is in the morning. We were really hurting her and ourselves by letting her in our bed. She even seems to be ready to get naps back in the schedule. It is wonderful! Go Kyrsten!!!

I also have to announce we went with the majority on the gaming system vote and bought the Wii. We have LOVED it so far, even Jeff. He is always playing it! Hayley loves it too, and is quite the golfer and bowler. She has beat us a couple of times. I do have to ask all of you Wii owners or those who have played, what are your favorite games? Saying the games are a little pricey, we only want to buy ones we will use and like. So, please let us know what you like.

As for me, no baby yet, which will be my big accomplishment. I am extremely ready for him to come even though I technically have a couple weeks. He has dropped quite a bit and seems to be pressing on a nerve, which is ever so uncomfortable along with the now daily swelling. Fun, fun, fun! I want him to come when he is ready, but I am praying that is soon! And yes, for those who care to know, we are going with the JACE spelling. Jeff was going to anyway, but he wanted to see what other people thought too. Thanks for all the votes.
Congratulations, you made it to the end of this ridiculously long post! Until next time...