Easter 2008

Hey, everyone! I know it's shocking for me to post again so soon, but we got some pretty cute photos and video of Ellie's Easter 2008 that I wanted to share.

In other news, many of you have heard that my grandfather (Dad's dad) passed away last week. I will definitely miss him, but he did live a good long life and we're grateful that he's whole again in heaven. The services will be this Tuesday afternoon, so please keep our family in your prayers.

We also moved my ultrasound to Thursday morning since it conflicted with the funeral time, so please keep that in your prayers as well that baby's head will be normal sized and all else will look good.

Enjoy the video and pictures! Video is a little over 2 minutes.

The baby swings were full, but does that phase our kid? No sir! Big girl swing suits her just fine!

And here she is going up the ladder in the bounce house. There were probably 15-20 kids ranging in ages from 2-10 in there with her, but she held her own!

After some work in figuring out that ladder, she made it to the top!

Our girl LOVES slides!

Pretty girl in her Easter dress

One Month to Go!

Hey, everyone. Just wanted to post a quick update. We got a cute video of Ellie saying her ABC's after us, so check that out below. It's a little under 3 minutes long. Baby is doing well. I had some pain and weird stuff going on early this week, but the doctor checked it out and everything is fine. I've been contracting a lot, so my body is already starting to get ready. I think she'll stay put for a few more weeks yet, though. We have a super busy but super fun weekend lined up. We have a birthday party and our Pinochle card game tonight. Then tomorrow, some sweet friends are throwing me a shower after church, we'll teach our FPU class at 4 and we have our LifeGroup at 6:30! Looking forward to all of it, though. UPDATE: I wrote that on Saturday and then had some issues loading the video below, so now it's Monday. Our day was long but went really well. The shower was lovely, and I'm super grateful to my friends for all their hard work. Check out how beautiful it was below!

Ellie is doing great. We did a bit of udpating to her room, and she seems to like her dots (check out the photos below). She's still really affectionate and generous with her kisses and loves to play at the park and watch Elmo. She still has Daddy's curls, so we've yet to cut her hair! Oh - and speaking of her hair, I must report that she spent the night with Cookie and Crouchburger again last weekend and had BEAUTIFUL hair now that they understand the process. :)

Lori pointed out that I haven't posted any sonogram pictures and not too many belly shots either. The sonogram picture thing is because we really haven't gotten any good pictures like we did with Ellie. We have another sono a week from Tuesday so we're hoping for some good pictures now since she should be plumping up pretty good by now. We shall see, though. In the meantime, you'll see my growin belly in the shower photos below. Here are a few new photos of Ellie as well.

She may not have a happy face, but doesn't she look cute??

We added the circles and the letters up top.

Don't you wish you knew what was under that pink blanket? Well, I'll tell you. It's new baby's name. That's what.

It looks a little lopsided since we had to partially disassemble it to get it home, but believe me - it was perfect the way Shelley did it. This was the "diaper cake" I got at my work shower. How cute is THAT?!

Our little cutie patootie at the park

Ellie going down the bounce slide at our friend Noah's birthday party

The beautiful table at my shower.

We're so blessed!

See?!

If You Want it Done Right....

you have to SHOW them how to do it. And don't leave anything out!

My parents have kept Ellie overnight twice so far. Both times it's been on a Saturday night so James and I can go out and then they just bring her to church on Sunday and we meet them there. The first time (in December) she was dressed cute, but her hair looked like she'd just rolled out of bed. I learned that my dad is the one that gets her ready, and he said that I hadn't sent anything to fix her hair - that was his excuse. (I did send her comb, and other than that you just need water, but evidently I wasn't clear!) So, this time, I sent the water bottle we use to wet her hair down, her comb, and even the Bedhead goop we use to keep her curls looking lovely. (We don't use it everyday, but I wanted them to have no excuse to fix her hair for church this time!) So, I told them that I'd packed all that stuff when I dropped her off on Saturday night. Well, she shows up at church and her hair looked like this:




And the pictures don't even do it justice. So, I asked them what happened. My dad comes up and says, "That goo was GROSS! I'm never touching that again!" They go on to explain, and it turns out that they tried to put the Bedhead in her hair whlie it was DRY! That, of course, just made her hair sticky and more tangled. Then mom thought she'd put the Bedhead stuff on the comb and try again. Oh my word..... And the thing is, you only need about a dime sized amount each time you use it - at the most. Heaven only knows how much they used, but let's just say that we could have not bathed her for a week and there would still be enough of the stuff in her hair when we wet it down to keep it curly. So, anyway, we got a big laugh out of that and told them they were supposed to wet her hair first. They were like 'Oh, so THAT'S what that water bottle was for!" Ummm...yes. Yes it was. Anyway, for contrast, here's what her hair looks like when I do it:

In other Wiebe news, all is humming along. The pregnancy continues to go well, and Ellie is tons of fun. Here's a video where she shows how much she loves the bath and some of her new words.

Ellie is growing up....

I'm sure that opening title is a shock to all of you. It may seem basic, but we reached a particularly interesting milestone just today. Read on...

First, I'll update regarding our holidays. Ellie did great at Christmas. She was really interested in opening all of her presents and really seemed to enjoy getting them. We didn't go crazy, but we did try to wrap a bunch separately, so she had a few things to open. Her gift from "Santa" (which she still has no concept of) was a Dora the Explorer tent with a tunnel. She crawled through it to get her milk on Christmas morning, which was really cute. We also gave her one of those magna doodle things, which she also loves. Also some big paper that goes on the floor for her to color on. She got some Praise Baby DVDs from Cookie and Crouchburger and some other clothes and books from Fritz and everyone else who loves her. She made out very well.

She continues to be a complete joy. She does cry, but rarely in public and not even that often at home really either. We're scared that this new baby won't be as angelic, but we know God made her just for us and we can't wait to meet her, too. Ellie is speaking up more and more lately. Here are a few of her words: yes, no, peek-a-boo, Cookie, Mama, Daddy, Elmo (more like Melmo), door, nose, mouth, up, out, off, please, etc. She does a lot of dancing, and she's getting really good at understanding us. I asked her to go get her shoes and socks from her room yesterday and she made one trip for her shoes and another to get her socks just like I asked. How nice is that?!

James continues to enjoy and do well with his counseling. He's gotten a bunch of new clients in recent weeks that are keeping him busy. He and I are also going to be going through a financial training class that will allow us to counsel people who are struggling with their finances. This is a passion for both of us, so we're excited about that opportunity. My work is also going well. I have a few more weeks and then things will slow down. I continue to feel well, too. The heartburn is around but nothing Tums can't handle. Otherwise, I really don't have any pregnancy compliants. We did all get that nasty cold over Christmas, so that was particularly fun for me when I can't take much for it... But we're all over it now and are grateful.

As for the new milestone I mentioned, we've decided to evict Ellie from her crib before the new baby is born, right? Well, we got a safety rail this weekend and were thinking we'd phase her into it with naps first and then overnight. I was thinking it would be a work in progress that would last a few weeks or so. Anyway, I decided to give it a try with her nap today. I just told her she was going to sleep in her big girl bed, did our cuddles and gave her her blanket and then left. She started crying, but she often cries for a minute or two when I put her in her crib, too. As usual, she quit crying in less than 5 minutes. She has her white noise machine that is reachable from her bed, and I heard it change sounds a time or two which means she was standing up messing with it, and then all was quiet. I waited a few minutes and then went in and she'd fallen asleep on the bed! I couldn't believe it. First time and almost no reisistance. She slept a full hour and a half which is about normal. Then the best part - I'd told her to stay in bed and call for us and not to get out until we came in. We did go in pretty fast when we heard her, but she stayed on the bed! I'm thinking I might as well give it a try for the overnight tonight as well since it was so easy today. I actually put her down while I was typing this and she's just in there talking to herself right now. I'll let you know how it went next time. I just can't believe how easy this kid does transition!

We had an ultrasound on Monday of the baby. We didn't get any great pictures, because she wasn't quite cooperating, but her head is measuring right on track which is great news. I'm really hoping to deliver her naturally, but much of that will depend on her head size. So far so good...

Here are a few photos from recent weeks:

About to crawl through the Dora tunnel/tent on Christmas morning

Elmo book from Cookie and Crouchburger

Opening her stocking

Ellie's first real Christmas dinner (mac & cheese continues to be the big hit)

Cute new outfit from Uncle Dave and Aunt Jen

"Why did you leave me in here when you're having fun out there?"

Pretty dress for the Christmas picture

With Crouchburger at the trains at Northpark

Pretty dress from Aunt Pen

Ellie with Aunt Pen and Uncle Bill

Messy girl wearing Daddy's socks

Our Baby (yes, I can still say that) sleeping her big girl bed for the first time

The Verdict Is In

Well, it's official. We found out on Monday that we are indeed having another girl! While we had hoped for a boy, we know this is God's perfect plan for our family. Ellie will have a little sister to become close to, and we've had some practice on that gender already. :) The baby looked completely healthy, so we're excited and grateful for that. The head was measuring dead on, but my doctor is going to be keeping an eye on that.

Everything else is also going well. We're all healthy, and Ellie is as cute and fun as ever. She says more words everyday, but most of her language is pretty unintelligible. We don't have any new pictures of her, but I'll get some more for you soon.

In other news, we did decide to stop doing our neighborhood newsletter last month. We were sad to let it go, but the sales weren't consistent and weren't matching the amount of work we had to do each month. James' practice is going well. He's had some new clients from outside the church and continues to enjoy the work. My job is also going well. I'm still working part time and enjoying my schedule.

Baby James is home and doing well. Here's one of their latest pictures.

Halloween Pictures!

We've been dealing with some illness in the Wiebe house, but the adults are both back to full health. Ellie started off with a double ear infection and bronchialitis, but she's down to one ear infection that's hopefully gone or almost gone and some stomach issues that are also almost over. She says more words each day, but won't always say them when we want her to. (How dare her disobey already?!) A few on her list: Mama, Dada, Amen, Yes, Shoes, Apple, Cookie (also my mom's g'ma name), and she even said Georgie once. We haven't been able to get her to repeat that one yet. (Don't worry, Aunts and Uncles. We'll get her to work on you guys next!)

All is well with Wiebelet 2. We find out the gender on 11/19, so stay tuned for that!

Mama and her Hershey's Kiss

Petting a rabbit at the petting zoo at the Fall Festival at church

My sign says "We Have a Bun in the Oven" and James is wearing an apron that designates him as the "Baker". We ended up winning a group prize for our little joke.

Also thought I'd add a couple of my two nephews as well. Baby James is doing well and set to go home any day.

Georgie as Elmo

And Sweet Baby James

A Trip to the Best State Fair in the Union

All is going primarily well in the Wiebe household aside from some illnesses running around. Ellie has bronchialitis and a double ear infection, poor thing. She's on medication, though, and seems more like herself again everyday. James is also sick with what his doctor termed "pre-pneumonia". And I cough about every 30 seconds. So we all have something... But I'm sure we'll be over it soon.


We took another trip to the State Fair of Texas yesterday with Cookie and Crouchburger. We had a great time as usual. Ellie had a lot more fun this year than she did last year (when she was only 5 months old). She got to see the animals up close in the petting zoo, and she rode some of the kiddie rides on the Midway.


In other exciting and a little scary news, my sister had her baby boy (who we thought was going to be a girl!) a month early last week. He weighed in at only 3 lbs. 12 oz. and is still in the NICU due to his size and some other minor issues. It's been a tough week, but he does better each day and they're hoping to take him home in the next couple of weeks. So, meet James Owen Brady below as well.

Ellie is so cool she has to wear shades.

Ellie's first fair ride - the kiddie swings. She loved it!

This is the big slide she went down with Daddy.

Finishing the slide

First carousel ride!

Introducing James Owen Brady, my newest newphew. (While James likes to think he's his namesake, he's actually named after both each parent's maternal grandfather.)

The One Year Montage

So, yes...it's true. I'm almost 4 months late on this. But better late than never, right? The below montage is about 10 minutes long, so you'll want to make sure you have some time. I've added some video that you've not seen before, though, so I hope you enjoy it half as much as we enjoyed living it.

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

On a separate note, I had my monthly OB appointment for the newbie. All looks good, and I even got to sneak another peek. Baby was moving around and had all four appendages, so all is well. It looks like we'll get to learn the gender sometime near Thanksgiving, so stay tuned!

Guess What.....

Well, that and that I took my first few steps in the last couple of weeks. I still prefer crawling, but at least Mama and Daddy know that I'm capable now. Maybe they'll get off my back!

Mama and Daddy saw the heartbeat on Friday. The baby is making Mama feel pretty yucky, but nothing she can't handle so far. I'm going to be such a good big sister, don't you think?

(Oh - and Mama wanted me to tell those of you that work at PwC that it's too early to tell work yet. So, keep it on the DL, yo.)