One Month Old

Today Kamryn is one month old. After one month I have to say she is a very good little girl. She took to the bottle like a pro and has since had very little problems with gas. What a blessing for her mommy and daddy. I can't begin to explain how nice it is to be able to use burp clothes instead of burp blankets. She actually likes tummy time to which I think is directly related to the above sentence. She has the cutests little sneezes in the entire world. She can sit contently for long periods at a time and if she start to fuss it is just her way or reminding mommy it is time to be wrapped up and put down for a nap. And most of the time, it is that easy. She has just stated to find a happy little voice and coo's occassionally. I love it. It is so fun to watch her little personality start to develop. I love her so much and am so grateful to have her in our family. Here she is at one month!!

Happy Easter

Easter snuck up on us this year and was gone in a flash.

We dyed eggs on Friday since Jacob was on-call Saturday. The kids had a great time dying and we managed not to have any spills or stains on clothes. I attribute this to their crazy mother who would let the kids set the eggs in the cup and then promptly set the cups on the counter away from any danger of being knocked over. I would bring the cup back long enough for the kids, to retrieve their egg and put it in the carton to dry. I think the part they enjoyed the most was coloring on the eggs using mom's "special" box of crayons that aren't broken into tiny pieces. And Kamryn enjoyed her bouncy chair the entire time. All in all, I would consider it a very successful Easter egg dying day.

On Saturday, we went to visit dad on-call. We came home with just enough time for a quick bath and then pj's and bed. Since dad was on-call and wasn't going to be home Easter morning I made a call to the Easter Bunny and requested that he bring the Easter fun while we were at church rather than in the night and he graciously complied.

Sunday Morning Jacob got home with a great case of the stomach flu. He was kind enough to dress up for an Easter-Family picture and then crawled back in bed again. I made it through my first sacrament meeting with 4-kids alone and have to say with few battle scars. In fact, I was rather impressed when the meeting finished and the only person I had to take out was Kamryn to change her diaper.

We came home to find that the Easter Bunny managed a visit while we were at church and the kids had a fun hour finding, sorting, and eating Easter treats. Notice how amazing the Easter Bunny is at color coding those Easter baskets. I don't know if the kids noticed but their mom sure did :)

Here is a video of the kids finding their Easter baskets. Kristian didn't find his basket for quite some time after we stopped filming as he was more concerned about eating the candy from his trail.

Our Easter Dinner wasn't quite up to par but what you gonna do. Since Jacob didn't feel good and I didn't want to get on the kids case for not eating the casserole potatoes I decided to bag the whole Easter Feast idea. Instead I made the kids their favorite, fettuccine alfredo (aka white noodles), made Jacob a slice of toast, and I enjoyed a wonderful egg salad sandwich, my favorite food of the Easter season. So everyone was happy and there was one pan to clean. Nice!!

We were not able to participate in the Annual Corry Egg-Stravaganza Egg Spinning Contest this year we had our own small family spinning fun. Spencer got pretty good at spinning his eggs and Jacob and I got a kick out of watching Kristian and Jessi stand up, and then lay down, and then stand up, and then lay down as they watched their eggs spin.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter and enjoyed the time to reflect on our Savior and his marvelous gift of the atonement.

Heber J Grant

Growing up there was always a wealth of quotes and pictures of Heber J Grant in our house. One quote in particular was often recited and I believe my mother has a few wall hangings with these words on them:

"That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do, not that the nature of the thing is changed, but our power to do is increased."

I have always correlated these words with President Grant's acquired talent of penmanship, and wondered what great talent I could acquire. Maybe I could learn to play the piano or something of the like, but up until today I had never really understood that he may not have been talking about some special talent that goes from pathetic to wonderful (as with the penmanship). Maybe he was talking about life in general.

I'm currently on my 4th call of my second month of OB and I've got to tell you this has definitely become easier for me to do. I still don't love OB and I'm not too excited when my pager goes off, but my power to handle what comes during an OB call has really increased.




Maybe if we have a few more kids it will be easier for me to deal with crying babies.......or maybe not.

Words of a 6 year old

Generally at night the two boys spend some time laughing and giggling before finally falling asleep in their room. Last night was no exception, but at one point Nader started crying out for his mother. I went in to see what was going on and Spencer said the following:

"I was kicking him in the face and he was laughing, then I kicked him in the face and he started crying."

That same evening Melissa and I were watching Survivor Tocantins. Melissa turned to me and said: "Could you imagine eating rice and beans for 40 straight days?"

Sometimes I wonder if she even knows me.

For those of you who don't know Survivor Tucantins is in Brazil, a country with who's customs and food I am intimately familiar.

An Update . . . Long but there are Pictures :)

So although I have not felt "completely" overwhelmed from day to day I find that three weeks have gone by leaving me wondering where they went. I have said for two weeks now, I need to post an update on the blog, and obviously it hasn't happened. So I am taking advantage of this time between conference sessions to update, here it goes.

Update - Jacob

Jacob was able to take off the last week of March which was a wonderful blessing for our family. He started the week getting some projects done. He rented a tiller and tore up the backyard, smoothed out the huge potholes, buried some tubing for the sump pump water to drain under our lawn and not over it, and then planted new grass. Now we just have to be patient and hope for a thick lawn. Jacob then moved to the inside and installed the crown molding in our bedroom. I love it. We then spent the rest of the week enjoying family time with the kids and my mom, including a walk around Norte Dame (no ones visit is complete without this gem), a trip to a buffet (Spencer's new favorite) and a trip down to Nappane and Shipshawana to see the Amish communities. The adults loved the beautiful scenery of the drive and the kids got a kick out of the horses and buggies. We didn't buy anything in all of the many many shops but we did happen to go on free pretzel day and so we all enjoyed homemade pretzels. They were fabulous.

Jacob started OB this month. His first call was Thursday and he got about 30 minutes of sleep total. It was brutal but he made it through and as his director told him, sometimes that all you can do. He just finished Warren Buffet's biography that I got him for his birthday and is now listing to his new biography on CD on his way to and from work. He is also continuing to bring up his desire to go to Nebraska for the Berkshire-Hathaway shareholder meeting next month and has ordered tickets for 4. I am pretty sure at this point he is going to go. (Jacob knows I can never really say no to him and for that I am grateful he thinks about things for quite some time before he asks me) He probably would enjoy some traveling companions if anyone is interested.

Melissa - Update

First off, thank you to all of the you who wished us well and congrats on the birth of our new daughter. We are very grateful and happy to have her in our lives. I recovered quite quickly from Kamryn's birth. I felt better the day I left the hospital than I did 3 weeks after Kristian was born. It is amazing the difference 2 pounds can make.

I loved having my mom here for two weeks. She was such a huge help. Every time I turned around she was making a bed, cleaning my stove top, playing with my children, cutting everyone's hair, or keeping me company during the 3 am feedings. Thank you mom!! Your visit was truly appreciated. I love you!!

While my mom was here we also got a few projects completed. We started the week purchasing my new bernina, which I love, and quite a little stash of fabric. This stash included about three separate trips to the fabric store which for my mom and I, is pretty much the best place to get to go and spend time. Kamryn joined us on these trips while Jacob spent time with the three others at home. A win-win situation for all. We (mostly my mom) made the boys room curtains, and the girls room curtain which I have wanted to do since November. It is amazing how much easier it is to make decisions about fabric with my mom than with my kids. We also made a new crib sheet that will match the girls room and got material for me to recover the bumper pads and make a quilt to match their room as well. I am excited to start that project.

It was super hard to say goodbye to my mom. However, since that day, I have had many friends jump right in to make sure I am doing well. Several friends have brought meals and on Thursday the wives club I am a part of threw me a baby shower that was just a blast. Thank you all for your generous support and love. I can't begin to explain how much it helps to know that we have such a strong support group here. We really do love you all.

Spencer - Update

Spencer is loving having Kamryn at home. He takes pride in telling everyone that he came up with her nickname, Kami, and absolutely loves to hold her. He likes to say that he has Spencer magic because every time he holds her she stops crying (at least he thinks so). He is taking on greater responsibility around the house and is a huge help to me daily. He has also learned to tie shoes in the last week to which he is very proud of. (I know this seems late but he has never had shoes with laces before so it was never a task he needed to know how to do.) He is getting better at reading (it's still slow but he is progressing) and has stumbled into the stage of needed to ask why, what, how and so forth about everything under the sun. A joy to his parents :)

Jessica - Update

Jessi was ecstatic to find out that the baby was a girl and she would finally have someone to sleep with her. She has always found it hard to listen to the boys play around at bedtime while she was stuck in her room alone. This excitement lasted for about 2 days and since I am greeted at 3am with Jessi giving me dirty looks and asking why it took me so long to come and get Kami and how she disturbed her sleep. Got to love it. Jessi really does love Kamryn and is also a huge help. She is my little errand girl and is constantly fetching me a burp cloth, diaper, or some other baby necessity, and does it with a smile each time, well almost each time.

Jessi has also experience a growth spurt and was so excited to get to pack away her 3t clothes and pull out the big box of 4t clothes. (thanks again Greg and Angeleah, what a huge blessing those clothes have been to us) She is quite the fashion connoisseur and loved prancing around holding all of her new dresses up to her. While doing this, my mother and I noticed that she is very long in the legs and several of the dresses were barely passing her bum. So a new project was founded. My mom and I took another trip to the fabric store (ah, I love it there) and got lace and ribbon to add to the bottom of these dresses. My mom, the amazing seamstress, proceeded to add this to the dresses and Jessi is now in seventh heaven as she can still loo lop about the benches at church and her dress still covers her panties.

Kristian- Update

Nader Man , what more can I say. He seemed to notice Kami's arrival but was more excited to come to the hospital to get a donut or push chairs around the hospital room. He seemed to have a day or two where he was struggling with the loss of mommy's attention but quickly got over it and moved on. He is all boy, and big boy at that. His new favorite is to run around the house yelling, in his own sweet animated language, He-Man, and the maders of da univberse. It makes us laugh every time.

Kamryn - Update

Kami has been a pretty good baby and I really can't complain one bit. She spent much of the first week and a half, eating, pooping and sleeping and very minimal crying. I was truely starting to believe that we might have a child that didn't have gas problems. And then things started to spiral down. She started screaming for an hour to an hour and a half after each feeding, struggled eating, and all in all, started to try her parents patience, especially at 3 am. I am sure in comparison to other children she would still be considered fabulous at this point but Jacob and I have never been know for our fondness of the infant stage.

Anyhow, I was sick on Wednesday and it was the straw that broke the camels back. We decided to stop the nursing and go to formula. Since, my life has been much brighter and Kami's gas seems to be getting much better. She is growing (she has gained a pound) and really is starting to be very alert of what is going on around her. She is trying to lift her head up and can roll quite a big onto a side. She is getting to that stage where you can start to see a little personality coming out of her and that is always a good change for us. She is truly a beautiful little lady, and a wonderful addition to our family.

And that is that. We love our little Family!!