Happy Easter!

It was Brooke's first easter! We got her a basket, but of course Luke and I had to "take care" of her basket, since she's still a little too young for that! These are as good as the pictures get when you've just had a baby :) Nothing fancy, but still have the memories.

Misty!

Yes, that is me walking the dog in that picture! My mom just posted these pictures on our family website. It brought back some good memories of our family dog! As an adult I've never had a desire for a pet. In fact I probably would never get one, if it weren't for Luke. He has been wanting a dog since he was a kid. He always had cats growing up, never a dog. His mom promised him he could have a dog when he was an adult. Well, I will be the one paying the price for that promise. I must say though after looking at these pictures of my dog it has caused me to feel excited to get a dog. We have been planning on getting one once we have a yard for it. Well, Luke is planning on getting a dog when we move to England. We will finally have space for one outside. If I could JUST convince him to pick a different one than an English Bulldog! I am open to any ideas you have of convincing him to get a different dog then that!!!!

Brooke

This was about 3 days or so before Brooke was born.
Proud older cousin, Tyler, holding our doll!

Cool uncle Joseph flew out from San Diego and his cool soon to be wife, Alyssa, flew out too!

Two of the four girl cousins together. Makena and Brooke are bonding for the first time, thank heavens for little girls!

Little feet and toesies!!

Beautiful aunt Joni came and held Brooke!

All my cool family came and visited Brooke and myself in the hospital. It was lots of fun.

Doll baby!

Precious!

First trip home from the hospital!

Daddy has been swept off his feet with his little girl!

The proud Oma of Brooke. This is who she was named after :)

Brooke Heather joined the world and our family on Friday, April 3rd at 10:49 a.m. She was 8 lbs 4 oz. 20.5 inches long. Contractions started at 2 a.m. Thursday April 2nd. They escalated throughout that early morning and into the evening. On Thursday morning I told Luke not to go into work, because I wasn't sure if and when we might need to go to the hospital. I wanted him close by where I knew exactly where he was. I decided I better tell my parents to go ahead and make the 45 minute drive from their house to ours, just in case. Meanwhile it was LJ's birthday on April 2nd (thursday), so while I was in the very early stages of labor I actually went shopping for LJ's presents I had been wanting to get him. I bought a cake, and got his presents all wrapped, etc. We then celebrated his birthday! Not long after that I decided it was time to go to the hospital. It was around 8 p.m. by the time they finally admitted me. (we had to wait in line at the registration office, even though I was pre-registered, that was definitely a first for me! I've never waited in line while I was in labor before!) Anyway, I got settled in to the room and they ended up giving me my epidural later that night. I got to sleep through the night pain free while the contractions continued all night. Only to have them completely stop by the morning time. The Dr. came in and broke my water around 6 or 7 a.m. Didn't do anything to help contractions. Next I got a dose of pitocin and that definitely did the trick! Brooke came so quickly that there wasn't even a Dr. in the room or anywhere near it when she was born. There was one nurse, and Luke that basically delivered the baby. The solo nurse ended up paging for help and about 6 nurses busted into the room at the same time! They all took care of Brooke and then the Dr. arrived. Brooke was healthy and that's all that mattered! Oh and the epidural definitely wore off after I had my pitocin given to me.

Brooke's middle name comes from my mom's first name, who we named her after.

We had lots of visitor's while in the hospital. Brooke is already a very popular girl!

Brooke is an angel! I'm half tempted to go change her name to Angel because it would be so fitting. She has been such a doll. She eats and sleeps and has very little complaining to ever do! The boys absolutely adore her! LJ held her for one hour straight a couple days ago because he refused to give her up! Kyle loves to hold her too, but doesn't quite have the attention span at his young age. We are so blessed and Luke and I have both completely fallen in love with her. She is truly a delight for us!!!

LJ Turned 5!!

LJ had his 5th birthday and it was quite exciting! Oma and Opa got to be here for our family celebration, what a treat! LJ got his first bike for his birthday, he loves it! He's been riding it almost every day since he got it. Fun times!

Our baby boy turned 3!!

I can't believe that Kyle is already 3 years old! It doesn't seem like 3 years have already gone by that fast!

FHE with Oma and Opa

My parents like to go visit the grandchildren and do family home evenings with them. By boys had an absolute blast with Oma's great ability to entertain them!! Luke was really enjoying it too :)

My distinguished gentlemen.

The boys insisted on buying a newspaper from a paper stand outside of the Cracker Barrel. So, it was obviously money well spent!

Geese near our house

We spotted these geese when we were driving home one day. Luke took a couple pictures. We thought it was pretty cool looking.

Sooo tired from playing so hard!

Kyle was so tired he zonked out on the floor while LJ was at preschool.

St. Louis

Luke and I got to go see his sister and her husband in St. Louis. It was fun visiting with them :) For some reason we always go to the Zoo wherever we are, it's our family tradition...even if it's FREEZING cold outside! This Camel is ready to spit at Luke, it never did spit, but it sure looked like it was going to!

We are moving to....

England! We can't believe how fast all of this has come about! Luke had to go out of town last weekend, and while he was gone his work got ahold of him to offer him a job in England. We are so excited for this new adventure in our lives! I'm a bit sad as we won't be near my family anymore. LJ has already expresses how he is going to really miss his cousins. However we hope to learn a lot and really enjoy our time together in England! So, visitors are welcome! We should have plenty of space if anyone wants a place to stay out there :) We will most likely be leaving in the beginning of May. It will be an adventure because we will have our 3rd little one with us and she will be a month old :)

It's time to post about Christmas, even though it's almost 2 months later :) The boys had a great Christmas morning. They seemed to like all their presents. They are still playing with most of their new toys. It's amazing how certain things can occupy their time so nicely. They are really into little action figures right now. Fun times! My christmas tree I got for only $60! It is prelit too! It was from linen's and things, going out of business. It was the last one left in the store, I was so lucky to get it! Now I don't have to worry about a christmas tree anymore every year, yay!