Isaac's 2nd Birthday

Basically, a camera dump from the birthday & party.  If I go into details about the festivities, I will never get the blog updated.  :-)  Judy also gave me her pictures, but I haven't had a chance to look through the CD's yet...  These are the ones from my camera.

Isaac's first order of business at the party:  find a dump truck for playing

A quick rest for Mommy and Laine:

Snuggling girls:

My beautiful friend Allison holding Laine:

Isaac assessing the cupcakes (specifically, Henry's):

Unwrapping cupcake good-ness:

Sampling the icing:

MMM...

The Baby Mamas!!!  Archer, Bethany, Isaac, Heather, Allison, Anderson, Cash, Stephanie, Henry, and Candy:

3 outta 4 ain't bad!  Henry was busy with a balloon...

Me and the kiddos:

Easter Egg hunt at the party.  Isaac had fun finding the eggs and would happily put them into any basket available.  It was really sweet that they had so much fun hunting and are all still too young to be terribly selfish about the results.

Ride 'em, Cowboy:

Yup, he's a native Texan.

Isaac got bubbles in one of his birthday gifts:

Jackson has just as much, if not more, fun than Isaac does with bubbles.

Isaac's birthday was on Easter this year, so Laine celebrated in her own special outfit (My First Easter):

Easter Egg Hunt (at home):

Isaac's Easter basket from Grandma and Grandpa:

Opening birthday presents:

Birthday cupcake:

Father & son relaxing in the yard:

Being silly:

Laine's first Cabbage Patch Kid.  Thanks, Nana!

Isaac and his lawn mower, a gift from our friend Marielk.

In action...

...the REST of the story

Our amazing doula, Shelley, has also written up our birth story.  I LOVED reading it!  It makes me smile just to see this from another perspective.  It really was like arriving at a party when we got to the hospital. We were all in great spirits and there was a lot of very positive energy.  I also remembered a few details...  I had forgotten that we finally told Andrea (Dr. C) that Todd had been calling her "Doc Bubbles" for the whole pregnancy.  Shelley also said that the volume got higher and higher as we got closer to Laine's arrival.  Because we were in Room 2, we were really close to the nurse's station.  Shelley was commenting that they probably knew EXACTLY where we were throughout the labor as the tone and volume changed.  I had to laugh when she commented that "some mothers prefer soft voices.  You definitely weren't responding to that."  Ha ha ha!  Anyone who has ever met me would attest to that.  LOL


Another fun story happened about 2 weeks after Laine's birth.  Shelley was meeting with another client.  This woman is due in mid-May and has some concerns that she will need to be induced.  Shelley told her that there were things she could do to encourage labor to start naturally.  The mom responded that she had been researching that.  Shelley asked what she had learned.  One of the things the mom mentioned was Reale's pizza.  Shelley said she had another client (me) who had just told her about Reale's and it was something I had tried.  The mom asked, "did she VBAC?"  Shelley confirmed that I had.  She then asked, "does she have blonde hair?"  Shelley said I did and asked how this woman knew this.  Here's the great part:  she Googled Reale's pizza and labor or induction or something and... MY BLOG POST CAME UP!  How freakin' cool is that?!  I hope my story is able to help this other mom in some way.


I love this birth story.  All births leave us changed in some way.  This story healed the hurts that still remained from Isaac's story and I can now say that I have 2 stories that warm my heart to tell.  I have wonderful children and I am incredibly blessed.

April!

In one week, I will have a 2-year-old and a 2-week-old.  WOW.


Not much time to chat, but here are some pics from the last week:

Elke and Milena came by for lunch on Friday.  They brought a gift for Laine and one for Isaac.  New (plastic) Black & Decker tools were a hit with Isaac, Grandpa, and Daddy!

Yesterday was beautiful, sunny, and warm, so Isaac broke in the pool a little: