Rodeo and smiles!

To start off, here is a picture of how big Logan has gotten. He is getting so long. Logan is usually happy after he eats in the morning and often smiles and "talks" to me, but I have never been able to catch it with the camera. On Friday, I was finally able to catch him while he was playing. I was so excited that I finally got a picture of his smile.

On Friday, we went to the Professional Bullriding in Guthrie,OK with some friends from church. None of us had ever been to the Lazy E Arena, so we were using the GPS to get there. It was one of the roughest rides we had ever been on. It took us on roads that we were surprised were even on the GPS. Needless to say, it took us a lot longer to get there than we were expecting. We still made it for the whole show. I told Ben before we went into the arena that I didn't know if I would have as much fun in the arena as I did trying to get there! Here are some pics from Logan's first rodeo.Opening Ceremony

Ben and Logan at Bullnanza

Ben was asking Logan if he wanted to go and see the bulls. This was Logan's reaction. A wild ride!

The following pictures are of Logan playing with me on Saturday morning. We have also started working with him to take a bottle. Last Monday, I had Ben give him his first bottle and he drank the whole four ounces with no problems. I wanted to make sure that this wasn't a one time deal, so we gave him a second bottle on Tuesday. He drank 4.5 ounces, but he was still acting like he was hungry. In fact, Ben was still holding him and Logan latched on to his arm. I went ahead and tried to feed him. He ended up eating off both sides. No wonder he has a Budda belly by the time he is finished eating. Well I hope that you have enjoyed the update and pictures.

Logan's first video online.

Logan has grown so much. It is hard to believe that he is already over a month old. I put him on the scale with me the other day and it said that he weighs 11 pounds. I am so glad that I am not on the diet that makes you gain 3 pounds in one month. Ben and I attempted to measure his length while he was lying on the floor on Saturday. We came up with 23 or 23 1/2 inches. He has become a lot more alert and is constantly looking around at everything. I am going to try and include a video of the first time I put one of his toys on the floor next to him. He initially was looking up at the ceiling, but then I turned the little piano on and it got his attention immediately with the flashing lights and music. In the video it kind of sounds like he is trying to talk to it. Unfortunately, the phone rang so I had to stop recording him. He has also discovered his mobile on his swing. He loves to just sit and watch it go around. I have also discovered that Logan loves to be outside. There have been a couple of days when he was being fussy, so I took him outside. As soon as we got outside, he was content and didn't make a sound. He just sat on my lap and looked around. This isn't really a good thing, because (1) there haven't been too many days that it hasn't been 100+ degrees, (2) I really don't like the heat, and (3) I don't like bugs. For some reason it seems that I am the only one they are attracted to. But I guess if it makes Logan stop crying, I am willing to take him outside, even if it is for just a few minutes. One other thing, we have figured out that he likes to sleep with his blanket up next to his face, just like I do.Well I will try to post more pictures soon, but I will have to wait until he wakes up to take some more pictures. I am still trying to catch him rolling over and also when he is smiling. One of these days I will be able to share them with you.

An overdue 2 week update

It is hard to believe that Logan is now three weeks old as of yesterday, but I haven't had a chance to post his two week update. We took him to the doctor for his two week check on Friday June 19. He weighed 9 lbs and the nurse thinks he was 21 1/2 inches. Ben wasn't sooo sure because Logan was moving all over the place. The doctor was very pleased at how well he was growing and said she didn't need to see him back for another six weeks, which is when he will get shots. I am definitely not looking forward to this appointment. During this past week, Logan has hit a few milestones. First of all, we picked up Grammy Crawford, Aunt Tessa, Aunt Tesha, and cousin Austyn at the airport on Friday. Austyn wasn't sure what to think about Logan, but he did get to hold him a little bit. Austyn would hold him for a few seconds and then push him away. Austyn also did not like when Logan cried. The one day we were all out in the living room and Logan was back in his bed. He started fussing and Austyn immediately ran back to his room and was trying to hold his hand through the crib railing. It was soo cute. Mom was amazed at how much smiling Logan already does. (This is such a reward for me in the middle of the night when I get up to feed him.) She was also amazed at how much grunting and noise he can make, especially when he is trying to dirty his diaper. While they were here, we got pictures taken of Austyn and Logan together. What a challenge that was! As soon as I get the pictures, I will put them on here for you to see. On Monday, Logan's cord fell off while Tessa was changing him. She asked me if I wanted to keep it, and I told her no. Then Ben came home from PT and she asked him if he wanted to keep it. He also said no and threw it in the trash. Tessa did such a good job at cleaning his belly button after it fell off. Wednesday, I put Logan down on the floor for tummy time and he rolled over for the first time. We knew that it wasn't going to be long before this happened, because when we were at the doctor he was holding his head sooo well and the doctor said that she could tell he was very determined. Fortunately, my mom also witnessed it and then when Ben got home, Logan did it again. Unfortunately, I have not been able to get this on video, but I did try. Since my family was here to help out when I needed it, I got a chance to catch up on some lost sleep. Well as this picture shows, we were having mommy and Logan nap time. We are covered up with my blanket that I have had since I was little. It was so nice for Logan to finally meet some of his extended family. Although they were very good at spoiling him by holding him all the time. Hopefully this isn't too hard of a habit to break. Thanks for all your help and advice this past week. (Sorry I didn't take more pictures while you guys were here, maybe you can send me some of the ones you took.) We look forward to seeing you again in August!

Today, Logan got his first bath in his tub. Ben has decided that bath time is his and Logan's special bonding time. So Ben has given Logan most of his baths since we brought him home from the hospital. This was very entertaining for me, because after a few baths in the kitchen Ben decided to do his sponge baths in the bathroom. Ben would put the basin in the tub and he would then get in the tub with Logan and bath him that way. Normally Ben had to change his shorts after he was done, not because Logan splashed, but because he would usually squeeze the wash cloth and water would go all over himself. Unfortunately, I always forget to take pictures, but I do have some from his bath tonight.

Logan wiggled his way into this position.

Well I think that about covers the big things going on in our lives. We hope that everyone is doing well and we look forward to hearing from you.

Logan James has arrived

For everyone who hasn't heard, Logan James arrived on Friday, June 5 at 12:50 pm. He was actually born on his due date, which is good because I was beginning to wonder if he was ever going to make his debut. Anyway, he weighed 8 lbs 9 oz and was 21" long and he has a lot of red hair. People are amazed at how big he is and how much hair he has. I kind of thought that he would have a lot of hair, since I was continuously having indigestion. Our first family photo.I am trying to hold him for the first time, even though I am still in the process of being put back together. The doctor told me that I had to keep my hands under the blue cloths, which was a little frustrating, but I knew that I needed to let her do her job.

I guess this picture already shows his true personality.Logan in his going home outfit. His shirt says Do Not Disturb. The one nurse thought this was very fitting because he got mad at her every time she tried to take his vitals. Logan in his swing. This is the only place that we have found so far that he does not uncover himself while he is sleeping. Thanks Aunt Lisa, Uncle Ted, and Alexis for this wonderful gift.Logan sleeping in his swing. We think he looks soooo cute with his little sheep ears. Well I think that about takes care of the updates for Logan and his first couple of days. Hopefully I will be able to send some more pictures soon.

Nursery, Last prego pics???

So I am once again a little behind on updating our blog. I have been waiting for Ben to get the nursery done so that I could post some pictures. Well the painting is finally finished and we put the crib up last night. I know, nothing like waiting until the last minute. Besides putting up the letters of his name, a few other decorations, and putting a few things away, it is finished.

Ben is just getting started with the painting here. He came up with the idea of how to paint Logan's room. You can tell by this picture how much tape it took to do this.One color done, 3 more to go!Ben working on the green stripes. This is not quite what Ben had in mind, but I am glad that he decided to stick with it. He actually wanted to do more stripes, but he was really glad that he didn't. They ended up being more of a hassle than he was expecting. The finished product. Changing table with the bins that we found to match the color scheme.

Ben was recently in a wedding for one of the guys that we go to church with. The two flower girls (Haleigh and Makenna), who also go to our church just love hanging out with Mr. Ben, so we made sure that we got a picture of them together. They were so excited at my shower that Mr. Ben actually played with them, instead of helping me to open the gifts, even though this was the first time that he had met them.

He just has a special way with kids. I am anxious to see how well he does with Logan.

FINAL PREGNANCY PICS??? Well I am hoping that these will be the last of the pregnancy pics for a while. These were taken last Thursday and it just continues to amaze us how big my belly has gotten. Fortunately, I think I can honestly say that it is all baby.

We are hoping that this baby decides to make his appearance before the end of the weekend! So just in case he does come before the weekend is over, here is a picture of me today. 39 weeks 5 days

Blessing in Disguise...

Last Monday while I was folding clothes in the living room, I heard something fall. I went to investigate, but I couldn't find anything out of the ordinary. Well, being this far along in pregnancy and having stood up, I of course had to go to the bathroom, again. So, I went, but when I went to wash my hands I had no water. I went out to the kitchen to see if I had water out there and I didn't. So I called Ben. He asked me if there had been anybody out by the road who might have turned our water off. (That is what happened the last time, I didn't have water.) I told him that I didn't see anybody. He told me to go and check to make sure that the water was still on at the road. Well, I stepped out onto the porch and saw some water coming out of our garage. I made mention of this to Ben and he told me to go and check the garage first. So I did, fortunately it was only a small stream and it hadn't got any of the stuff in the garage wet except the floor. So Ben told me to go and turn the water off at the road and that he would be on his way home. Well, needless to say, because Mondays are his PT days, he had only work 2 hours that day. He got home, changed his clothes, and crawled under the house. He loves crawling into the crawl space, NOT! I was right, something had fallen and it was the pipe under the house. Fortunately, it was somewhat of a cheap and easy fix. BABY SHOWER at the CHURCH On Saturday, our church had a baby shower for us. There were about 25 people there. One of our guy friends came to keep Ben company, so that he wasn't the only guy there. However, Ben hadn't been planning to go, but when he heard that Scott was coming, he decided that he should go, so that Scott wasn't the only guy there. Funny, how they were both trying to look out for the other. Unfortunately, Saturday was not one of my better pregnant days. I think I tried to do a bit too much leading up to the shower. Friday, I decided to clean my hardwood floors. It started out that I was just going to sweep them, but then I decided to also mop them. I had to take a few breaks to get them all done, but I finally finished them. We didn't do much Friday evening since I had used all my energy on the floors throughout the day. Then Saturday before we headed out to the church, I wanted to make vegetable soup, so that we would have supper when we got home. So again I was standing for a long time cutting vegetables. By the time, that I got ready to go to the shower, lets just say I was feeling quite tired and my feet had swollen. I was going to wear cute little heels, but decided to settle with just some black sandals. It also seemed that Logan was lying in an odd position, so that didn't help things either. At the shower, we got a lot of clothes and other nice stuff. Here are some pictures of the us at the shower and some of the things that we got. We were so excited to get some Steeler's stuff. We got this stuff from our church friends who are also Steelers fans. Thanks Jim and Karen!!! One final note... I went to the doctor on Tuesday and she continues to say that everything looks good and that we are right on schedule. She also informed me that Logan has flipped and is now head down. This is such a blessing and answer to prayer. I go back to the doctor in two weeks, but then I will be going every week after that. I will do my best to keep everyone updated. Well LOVE and MISS you!!!

More Prego Pics!

So I know that it has been about a month since I updated our blog, but nothing really exciting has been going on. Let me try to update you as to what has been going on in our neck of the country. A couple of weekends ago (March 20-22), Ben and I got to watch Rob and Amy's girls so that they could go to a marriage conference with their church. The girls arrived Friday morning and stayed with us until Sunday evening. They were very good for the most part, however, we did have to discipline them a little bit. We even had to initiate the "Time out stump." We were outside playing and Madison wasn't playing nice so I told her to go sit down. Well she started throwing flowers and Ben told her to stop and she didn't listen, so he made her go sit on stump over by the wood pile. This is where we came up with the time out stump. The girls enjoyed discovering different bugs that were in our back yard. We found a grasshopper, a cricket, and a lady bug. All three of them liked holding them in their hands and letting the bugs crawl over their hands. The twins have grown sooo much since about two years ago when we were in Ohio and Emma would have nothing to do with holding bugs in her hands. They also enjoyed helping to plant potatoes in the garden. Ben would give them the potato and tell them to put it right in front of his boot and they wanted to get it just perfect. Also while they were here, I helped them make biscuit pizzas. They liked to stretch the dough and put the sauce and toppings on. They are such little helpers sometimes. Both Friday and Saturday nights, we had the girls in bed before 9 pm. We were quite impressed with ourselves on that accomplishment. We took the girls to church with us on Sunday and a lot of people were impressed with the fact that we were earlier than we usually are and we had three extra to get ready. We put the girls in their class and was in the sanctuary before the music started. (We usually walk into the sanctuary about the same time the music is starting.) We loved having them at the house, but I was also ready for them to go home. I have come to understand why God usually tries to break you in slow with having kids. Ben recently went through a two week training to be apart of the Base Honor Guard. It was a volun"told" type of thing. He kind of volunteered, but he was also told that he was their choice to represent his group. He is now able to participate in the special ceremonies such as funerals, base services, and some other special events. This is one more thing that he can put on his profile that will help him to look good for upcoming positions and also his promotions.

I am just over 31 1/2 weeks along. It is hard to believe that it is only 8 1/2 weeks until my due date. When we were at church last night, people were asking how i was feeling and I have to admit this is the first time in my whole pregnancy that I have felt really BIG. It seems like Logan has grown sooo much in this last week. I go to the doctor every two weeks now and at my last two appointments they told me that he was breech. We are not too concerned about this at this point in time. But as the time gets closer, we will definitely start praying harder that he will flip on his own. Well I think that about updates everyone as far as what has happened in our lives. Look forward to hearing from you soon.