Latest pictures of Natalie (2 ish months)

This little girl is changing quickly. She is really sweet (most of the time) and gives the best little smiles. However, those smiles are insanely hard to capture with my camera!

Callie's Birthday Party

We may have already celebrated Callie's birthday with friends, but I am cherishing the last few days that my baby is still five! Callie turns six on Christmas Eve. We have started a tradition where we do a "friend party" in mid December and then celebrate with family on her actual birthday. This past Friday night, we had six friends over for her party. The girls enjoyed pizza and Christmas cookie decorating. Here are a few pictures from the night. Note the fire in the background on the first picture. We are loving having a wood burning fireplace! It makes everything seem cozy!

Coleman's 3rd Birthday

I am a little late getting these pictures up. A couple of weekends ago, we celebrated Coleman's 3rd birthday. I can't believe my little boy is 3 already! If I had to describe this party, I would call it simple and classic. I wanted to do a small party, but with a new baby I knew I couldn't do everything. So, we had no theme or color scheme, and I didn't make the cake. It made no difference to the kids! They had a blast playing in our backyard. We played ladder golf and pin the tail on the donkey. It was a fun little party.

More of Natalie and Halloween

Here are a few pictures of the kids around the house with Natalie. Rapunzel and Spider Man also had fun trick or treating with our friends the Vestals. Thankful that Papa and Bebe kept Natalie at home so I could go trick or treating with kids..

Natalie's Arrival and Birth Story.

Get ready for a barrage of pictures! I think updating this blog is going to be much harder with 3 kids, but I am going to try and keep it up. Natalie Elizabeth Brooks joined us exactly two weeks ago (October 5th) at 2:07 pm. I realize most people are probably uninterested in the labor details, but I will share a few because I always like to hear a good birth story. Quick background on me. I discovered with Callie, that epidurals do NOT work on me whatsoever. I had 3 failed epidurals (administered by 3 different doctors) when in labor with Callie. All 3 failed to take. With Coleman I didn't even attempt any pain relief, and I will say the pain was exactly the same, thus confirming my suspicions that the epidurals with Callie truly did have no effect on me. So, with basically 2 natural labors behind me, I pretty much accepted that natural labors are my "lot" so to speak. I had no plans with Natalie of trying for any pain relief. I will say though, if it were not chosen for me, I could never go through a natural delivery simply of my own choosing. I am just not that tough! My contractions with Natalie started Sunday morning around 7 am. I couldn't have timed it better. The Lord gave me a good nights sleep and woke me up at my normal wake-up time with contractions. Honestly I had a few contractions and then within an hours time they were painful enough for me to want to groan through them a bit. That was my signal that there was a very good chance this was real labor. I attempted to get breakfast for me and the kids. By 8:30 I was so distracted with the contractions that I had put a movie on for the kids. I started slowly packing a hospital bag. By 10 I could no longer hide it from the kids. Callie said "I've never seen mama in such pain" as I knelt by the bed and dealt with a contraction. Coleman would come encourage me through some of them (prompted by Charlie) to say "good job mama, good job." It was sweet. Thankfully Charlie's parent arrived by 10:20 to take the kids to church. I would not have wanted them to see me in much more pain for fear that it would upset them. By 10:30 my mother and step dad were well en route to Atlanta. I would have been shocked if these contractions had just stopped. They were too strong. Charlie sat with me and timed my contractions. He encouraged me and in between contractions I gave him instructions on how to finish packing and what to put in the car. By 11:30 I knew that based on the pain I was in, I was ready to head to the hospital. It was a gorgeous fall day. I stuck my head out the window on the car ride and groaned through contractions. I don't know why I stuck my head out the window. I think maybe the air blowing in my face was a distraction from the pain. I had not had my cervix checked at all this pregnancy so I had no idea if I had dilated any at all prior to the start of labor. I told Charlie I would be devastated if I was not at least 4 cm. when we arrived, but secretly I was hoping for 6cm. We arrived at the hospital (took a while for me to walk into the hospital, pausing to work through some rough contractions). I am sure I got many looks. By 12 we were checked in and they checked me and I was 6 cm! yay! I was thankful for that. Within about an hour my midwife arrived and she checked me again. At that point I was 8 cm. Yay! I was getting somewhere. I knew Lord willing it would all be over soon. My mother arrived somewhere in that point of time and a dear friend that lives here in Atlanta, Diane Henley. Diane has had 2 natural deliveries herself and helped in a couple deliveries of friends. She was a great assistance. After Diane arrived it was not long and I was ready to push. This was the point of this labor where I really felt like I could not do it. In the previous two labors my worst part had been transition. This time around, it was pushing. Natalie was squirming and trying to turn her head sideways thus making it hard for her to get in a good position to be born. I really don't understand what happened, but I was praying hard, asking God for strength for each push. Finally, Natalie got in a good position and after about 45 minutes for pushing, she was here! We were thrilled and so thankful for healthy baby girl. Enjoy the pictures. They are from the first few days in the hospital and the first few days at home. Callie and Coleman are adjusting really well to having a baby sister. They are both very excited. Callie was so excited to tell her teacher and her classmates. Coleman is super sweet with Natalie, such a dear big brother all ready. We did have a hard first week though. We passed around a stomach bug which was just miserable and stressful as I was fearful that Natalie would catch it. Thankfully she has not. Thank you all for prayers on our behalf. Keep the prayers coming as we adjust to being a family of 5. We are thankful for all God has done in answering our prayers for a third child. She is a blessing!

Adventures With Coleman

I am 39 weeks pregnant tomorrow which means Baby Natalie will be here before we know it! The past month or so since Callie has started school, I have been trying to think intentionally for my time with Coleman. I have felt the reality that the middle child often does not have a long season of Mom's undivided attention. I really have been cherishing my mornings with him. I came up with a few special things that I wanted to do with Coleman before his little sister arrives. The first big thing we did was visit the dinosaur exhibit at Atlantic Station. He had a blast. The dinosaurs were "animatronic" which means they moved and growled. He especially liked the ones that you could push a button and make it growl, move it's head, move it's tail, etc.

After the dinosaurs, I decided it was time to start doing "letter of the day" with Coleman. I did that with Callie in Minnesota. We would talk about a certain letter and plan an activity that went along with it. For the letter A we did "A is for Airplane" We went to the peachtree/dekalb airport. This place is awesome. We saw lots of small planes take off and land. They also have a nice playground you can play on while you watch the planes. Coleman loved it!



The next week we did "B is for Bird" We went to the zoo and visited the bird exhibit. We enjoyed feeding the birds with a seed stick.
Finally, this past Monday we went to the farm. I am glad that I waited until this week to do it because it was gorgeous and it actually felt like fall. We couldn't have picked a better day. We visited the Kinsey Family Farm in Gainesville. We enjoyed a hayride. We picked out pumpkins for the front porch. We fed the fish and the animals (including a horse, donkey, and some goats.) We are excited about meeting Natalie, but for now I am just cherishing these last days as a family of four