Olivia's First Trip to Mount Vernon

The weekend of August 22 Olivia and I decided to head up to Mount Vernon for a visit.  We stayed Tuesday through Friday.  Our first stop Tuesday afternoon was Great Grandma Toddy's house.  This is my mom's mom.  I have wonderful memories from when I was little playing with my grandma at her house on the hill.  At 86 she is still down on the floor playing with the kids!  She's absolutely amazing!

She was so excited to hold little Olivia for the first time.

Jack loves hiding in things.  He quickly cleaned out the toy cabinet and began hiding in it.  Charlie quickly discovered where he'd gone and began playing peek-a-boo with him.  It was so precious!  I love seeing my sister's kids play together and am so excited for Olivia to get to join in on all the fun with her cousins!

On Wednesday I left early in the morning to go meet up with my cooperating teacher from my student teaching, Tia.  She is a wonderful person and teacher; I was very fortunate to get to teach with her!  She was also pregnant when I was student teaching in her classroom, and Olivia was born on the same day as her son.  Very special!  We drove down and met her in Marysville at Starbucks for a quick visit.  (I forgot to take any pictures).  We were back in time to go with my sister, the kids, and my mom to Washington State Park in Anacortes.  We met up with one of my sister's friends, Jennet and her daughter and one of Emily's best friends, Olivia.  My sister and I used to love coming to this beach to play and camp when we were little.  It was a great day at the beach!

On our way home from the beach we stopped by my dad's.  Grandma Patti hadn't seen Olivia since she was born, so she quickly scooped her up when she got home from work and got in some grandma time.

Uncle Bryan had watched the kids for my sister both times she came down to visit so this was the first time he'd gotten to see and hold Olivia.

Wednesday evening my good friend, Amy, from high school stopped by to visit with her mom, Nancy and Amy's daughter, Haley.  I forgot to take any pictures.  They came bearing several gifts including fleece sleep sacks.  Olivia didn't have any of these yet; they are the best thing ever!  She's sleeping longer at night because she's so warm and snugly!  Thank you Amy, Haley, and Nancy!

Thursday we spent all day at Grandma Emily's with the cousins and Auntie Anne.  It was a great day!  I love how Olivia's cousins just can't get enough of her.  They already love her so much!  It's so sweet and I love knowing that she'll have so much fun playing and growing up with them in the future!  

Charlie was wondering what all the fuss was about.  He couldn't see Olivia in her cradle from the ground.  I lifted him up to look inside and when he discovered her he let out the biggest squeal of laughter.  It was the cutest thing ever!  He kept lifting himself up to look in the cradle, belly laughing each time.  He even reached out to touch her and tried to give her a hug!

When Olivia was done, Charlie decided he wanted to take a turn.

There's nothing better than spending a few good days with family.  We missed Zach and couldn't wait to get home to see him, but soaked up every moment of our time with my family.  It was some well needed time for both of us.  My mom took Olivia and I ran errands by myself for the first time.  She also took Olivia at 3 a.m. and let me sleep in until 7 a.m. one morning.  A little sleep goes a long way; I felt like a new person!  I only wish we lived closer...

Dan and Melissa's Wedding

We took our first long road trip the weekend of August 20 to attend my cousin Dan's wedding on Fox Island.  It was a beautiful venue and a true celebration of love.  Olivia got to meet her great Grandpa and Grandma Mandeville for the first time.

My cousin Dan, his wife Melissa, and Great Grandpa and Grandma Mandeville.

Olivia's First Visitors

We were released from the hospital Thursday, July 28 and home by 4:30 p.m., less than 24 hours after Olivia was born.  My mom, sister, Emily and Charlie greeted us with smiles and tons of our favorite foods: pasta salad, chicken salad, Paccioni's pizza, chips, and plenty more! 

Emily was SO excited to see her new little "sister".  She explained to me that she decided while Olivia is little she will be Emily's little sister and when she grows up then she can be her cousin. 

This was the first and last time my sister and I will nurse our children together.  It was a sentimental moment.

Olivia at the Hospital - Part 2

I'm still working on catching up.  My mom has been here the last few days, so I've been able to get a lot done.  I'll post more soon!

Zach announcing our baby girl to our families .  I'm not sure who the lady in the blue shirt on the left is... she's NOT family!



Zach and his parents, Grandpa and Grandma Mitchell.

The family quickly scooped her up!  Auntie Anne was the first to hold her.





Olivia's first bath.

I love this picture of Zach just staring at her.  He looks so proud!

Because I didn't have any drugs I was able to walk from my delivery room to my postpartum room.  It felt SO good to walk, and the nurses were really impressed with me!

Our sweetheart baby girl.  She is just absolutely perfect!



6 Weeks

The pictures say it all.  This was the first time I was able to snap a quick picture of Olivia today where she wasn't crying.  The last week has been a trying one for everyone in our house.  Poor Olivia is having tummy and gas issues, which means her mommy isn't getting very much sleep.  It's the worst feeling in the world to be holding your screaming child and nothing you do helps.  We go through the 5 S's (shushing, sucking, laying on their side, swaddling, and swaying/swinging), I've tried the gripe water, a warm cloth on her tummy, but nothing really consistently helps except for help.  Zach is amazing.  He comes home everyday after work and takes her for most of the evening.  I just keep telling myself "And this to will pass."  (Hopefully sooner than later for all of our well being.)  But it's worth it all and I wouldn't trade it for anything!

Before Olivia.... (Maternity Pictures, Deception Pass, and a Baby Shower)

It's true what everyone says... once you have a baby time flies and you have little time for blogging.  I've been dying to get these pictures up for weeks!  I'm going to do my best over the next couple of days to get caught up on my blogging.

The week before our sweet, little Olivia arrived we had a busy and fun week.  It began at Deception Pass State Park.  We planned an 8 day camping trip with my dad, Patti, and my sister and her family last October; little did I know I'd be 37 weeks pregnant!  The campground fills up so quickly that you have to make reservations at least 9 months in advance.

We joined the SNAPsisters baby club.  Instead of doing 3 or 9 month pictures we opted to get maternity, newborn, 6 months, and 1 year pictures.  Jodi decided to join us for the beautiful scenery at Deception Pass for our maternity pictures the first Saturday we were at Deception Pass.  As usual she did an awesome job!

Our original plan was for Zach to stay the whole week camping with everyone.  However, that changed when we found out we were pregnant.  He couldn't take a week off and then a couple of weeks later take another two weeks when the baby arrived.  So, we made the best of it.  He towed the trailer down Saturday, July 16 and stayed until Sunday evening when he had to head back for work on Monday.  He surprised me and drove back up to Deception Pass Thursday evening and was able to stay Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, July 21-23.  It was a super fun camping trip with everyone!

Sunday, July 17 we celebrated Charlie's 1st Birthday at the beach!

The next day it was off to the beach again to build sand castles.

Anne had planned a fun activity for the kids each day.  One day was confetti eggs!  We usually only do this at Easter, but because I forgot to bring my eggs this year we had plenty of extras for a fun camping activity.

Tuesday we decided to head down to the beach across from Cranberry Lake.  Everyone rode their bikes except for Patti and I.  She joined me in making the 2-3 mile walk.  In hindsight I'm sure it was all of this great exercise that helped little Olivia come a couple of weeks early!

We continued to spend our days down at the beach having a great time.  The weather was absolutely perfect!

Wednesday my mom and brother headed out to spend the afternoon with us at the beach.

We then headed back to the campground for the daily activity, painting rocks.

We may have been camping, but we ate like kings!  This particular night we feasted on a taco bar.

Wednesday evening the skies opened up and it absolutely poured ALL night.  Luckily Jack and Emily were sleeping with me in the trailer and somehow Bryan, Anne and Charlie managed to stay dry.  Bryan, my dad, and Patti all headed into Bayview to go crabbing, so Anne and I packed up the kids and headed into Mount Vernon.  It had stopped raining, but the ground was absolutely muck and mud.  We did a little laundry, showered in nice, big showers, and regrouped and headed back to camp.  On our way back out Bryan called to tell us they had stopped in at the Shrimp Shack one of their favorite placed to eat.  We met up there, ate some delicious food, and headed back to the campground.

Zach wasn't supposed to return until Saturday because of work.  He surprised us and came on Thursday evening!  We all headed down to the beach for some more fun memories.  

Dad and Zach toasted to our final morning at camp.

And the perfect way to end a perfect camping trip.... a perfect campfire at night.  I love, love, loved this trip!!  It was so relaxing and fun.  It brought back all of my childhood memories of camping with my own parents and grandparents.  I'm so excited for Olivia to have the same wonderful memories!

We arrived home the afternoon of Saturday, July 23.  I unpacked a little, showered, and got ready for my final baby shower hosted by my "Yogis" as Zach calls them.  As usual it was a great time, with wonderful friends and amazing food!