Kelsey's 3rd Birthday

Kelsey celebrated what some would call a Birthday week this year! The party began at preschool on Sept 30. Grandma made cupcakes for her class, and Kelsey got to be the Special Helper and wear a Birthday crown!

Kelsey at school

Birthday girl!

On her actual Birthday, she went to her first Ballet class and loved it! Later we had Nana and Grandma over for dinner and MORE cupcakes! Lhesa and the girls came for a quick visit after dinner. Kelsey was totally excited.

Grandma, Kelsey and Nana

Mom and Kelsey

Mmmm, cupcakes

Then came the BIG party. We had it at Guildford Recreation Centre. THe Instructors set up the gym for the kids and they got to play, run, jump, sing and dance. After we had lunch and cake. She had a Wiggles themed party because she love them and part of her gift from mom and dad were Wiggles concert tickets.

Happy 3rd Birthday Kelsey! Mommy and Daddy love you!

Silly cake face

Parachute fun!

Kelsey at Three Years Old

Kelsey weighs 32 lbs and is 36” tall. She wears mostly size 3 clothes and size 7 shoes.

Her favourite color is blue.

She loves music and dancing and I think she will become a very good dancer.

She loves playing with Disney Princess Barbies and PolyPockets. She’s not very interested in dolls. She likes playing doctor. Once in a while she will play Little People. Sometimes she plays on her own, but she usually wants mom and/or dad to play with her. She loves playing dress up with the clothes cousin Sophie gave her.

She loves having stories read to her and will request the same story over and over. We read Disney Princess stories (Cinderella, The Little Mermaid, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White), animal stories, Dora stories and the odd Robert Munch. After hearing a story a couple times, she can repeat it almost word for word. We read stories every might before bed.

Her favourite TV shoes are The Wiggles, Dora or Sesame Street. Her favourite movies are The Little Mermaid, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Beauty and the Beast and Beethovan (about a dog). She has also watched The Bee Movie, Tinkerbell, Finding Nemo, and Barbie.

She enjoys going to school (she started Pre-School at Fraser Heights Recreation Centre in September 2010), to dance classes and to the Tot Gym. She also likes picnics in the park and playgrounds.

She is very social, playing OK with some kids (i.e. Evelyn and Nadine, Nicole’s twins), but not very good with others (i.e. Colin, Dennis and Kyla’s son). Sharing toys and waiting her turn can be a problem. She likes playing with older kids more than kids her own age.

Her favourite foods are spaghetti, macaroni and cheese, sushi (California rolls) and ice-cream. She likes fruit. Her favourites are strawberries and grapes. She likes milk, cheese, eggs, and yogurt. She really likes peanut butter and honey sandwiches. If we eat at a fast food restaurant she wants chicken nuggets and chocolate milk. She doesn’t like fries much.

She is very independent and head-strong. She wants to do everything herself and can be very argumentative and bossy. She’s very smart, high energy, imaginative and loving. She’s a bit of a dare-devil, doesn’t fear much and likes to test boundaries. She’s beautiful, fun and happy; however has been known to have major tantrums if things don’t go her way. She loves to pretend she’s a teacher. It’ll be interesting to see if this is the career path she chooses later in life.

Just prior to her 3rd birthday she:
* Gave up her soother (sooie)
* Gave up having naps.
* Moved from a toddler bed into a twin bed.
* Started using the potty during the day (as of her 3rd Birthday she is not night-time trained)* Started Pre-School 2x a week for 2 ½ hours.

She can count to 20, sing her ABC’s, recognize letters and numbers (especially letters in her name). She can spell her name and knows when her birthday is. Thanks to Dora the Explorer, she can also count to 10 in Spanish. She can sing many songs and recite many nursery rhymes, some quite complicated. We are working on learning the days of the week and months of the year. She has very little concept of time.

She is very well spoken, but still replaces “th” sounds with “f” (i.e. baff for bath) and sometimes drops the “h” in words (i.e. otel for hotel). She will say “her is going to the store” and “are going to play games” rather than “we are going to play games.”

Kelsey at 3 years old!

September was Milestone Month

September was milestone month for both the girls....

Kelsey on her first day of preschool!

Kelsey started preschool at Fraser Heights Recreation Centre. She is in a 3 year old class that meets 2x a week for 2.5 hours. Her teacher's name is Rebecca and she is young and energetic. Each day they have circle time, free time, arts and crafts and outside play. Each month they have a different theme - September was apples and harvest, October was Thanksgiving and Halloween (of course). She loves school and doesn't mind one bit that I leave her alone.

Kelsey had to be potty trained to attend school, and although she's not night-time trained, she's about 95% during awake time! Yaaa, Kelsey.

Beautiful Big Girl!

Kelsey also gave up her "sooie" after we got home from Alert Bay. The sooies got forgotten, and once Kelsey made it through one night without them she decided the Sooie Fairy could come take them away. Kelsey was very dependant on her soothers for falling asleep and for comfort. She cried the first night without them. I had to stay in the room with her until she fell asleep. But we all survived. She asked for them religiously for about a week and after that she only asks for them if she's really upset.

Kelsey has given up naps this month. Poor mommy! We wonder if it's related to no longer sleeping with her sooie?

Everly in her jolly jumper

Everly rolled from her back to her front a couple days after her 4 month birthday. Now she's a rollin' machine! She loves jolly jumping and making all sorts for funny noises including squeeling tongue rolls! She's also getting better at holding and grabbing for toys.

Everly looking cute!

Kitties!

Meet the new additions to our family. Tinkerbell (black) and Beethovan (tabby) came to live with us just before the Labor Day long weekend. They're wonderful kitties. Loving and spunky and tolerant of not so gentle little hands. Overall, Kelsey is very good with them. They're a great addition to our family.

Sun Peaks Summer Adventure!

We also spent a wonderful weekend in Sun Peaks this August enjoying the lovely weather, resort feel, alpine environment and our brother-in-law's Bon Jovi Tribute Band "Blaze of Glory". It was nice to get away with our little family, but it was even better to spend some quality time with the Moores!

Doing the tourist thing!

Jim and Everly. Everly slept through Blaze of Glory's entire performance. Sorry Ted!

Uncle Ted (A.K.A. Jon Bon Jovi) singing to his girls.

We took a trip up the chair lift and walked a beautiful loop trail at the top. The view and wildflowers were amazing.

Kelsey, Hannah and Jim navigating their way through the flowers

Alert Bay!

We headed to Alert Bay for our big family getaway this year at the end of August. My dear friend and old boss, Michael, graciously let us stay in his beautiful home on the beach while he was away. I was able to visit with old friends and show my family around the beautiful North Island and Alert Bay. It was a lot of work with 2 small kids, but for the most part things went smoothly.

Kelsey at Rathtrevor Beach on the way up-Island

Everly and I at Gator Gardens, Alert Bay

Jim and Kelsey whale watching. We took a Whale Watching tour out of Telegraph Cove. We say Orcas, Dall's porpoises, and pacific white sided dolphines (and eagles, sealions, salmon jumping, and other water birds). It was awesome. It cost us a smal fortune, but was well worth it. Kelsey enjoyed it and both Kelsey and Everly were well behaved!

Jim and his girls in Telegraph Cove

Jim and Kelsey on the ferry home! Kelsey wasn't a fan of the wind.

Happy 35th Birthday Daddy!

We celebrated Jim's 35th Birthday in our backyard eating hamburgers and cake with his dad, Frankie, and my mom. Kelsey was so excited. She couldn't wait to get daddy a brown and blue cake (and we found one!). Summer birthdays are the best! Happy Birthday Daddy!

Kelsey watering her flowers after cake

Jim and Kelsey blowing out the candles on his brown and blue cake

Kelsey and Everly

Dad and son enoying a beverage in the yard.

Bath time is fun!

Everly loves having a bath. She smiles and coos and kicks her fat little legs and waves her fat little arms!

In the kitchen sink

In the bath tub

Everly at 2 months

Everly at 2 months (photo by Jerusha Chong)

The last 2 months have certainly been a whirl-wind and have been tough, but enjoyable for the entire family. At 2 months Everly weighs 12 lbs 6 oz. She gotten very tubby and has many rolls and dimples all over. She is strong and holds her head up when she's looking over a shoulder or placed on her tummy. Her arms and legs are constantly moving. She can follow us with her eyes and smiles big toothless grins when someone speaks to her. She has also started looking and smiling at toys. I'm doing a combination of breastfeeding and bottle feeding (with breast milk). She has had some problems nursing and some gas/reflux issues. I find she eats better from a bottle (less gas), but want to keep up with the breastfeeding in hopes we'll get better at it. At 8 weeks, we propped one end of her crib up (assuming she had some sort of reflux) and she took to it immediately and is no longer in my bed. She goes to bed about 11 PM and wakes to feed about 3-4 AM, then about about 6-7AM. During the day she still feeds ever 2-4 hours. She's awake most of the time now, although some days there are still exdended naps. She's a good baby, but not as content as Kelsey was to sit and observe the world around her. She's still happiest when she's held, but enjoys her swing and is starting to take to her bouncy chair.

Happy 4th Anniversary

Jim and I headed down to Washington to celebrate our 4th Anniversary (kid-free) on July 10-11. Everly stayed with Jim's mom and sister and Kelsey went over to my mom's house. We started in Mt Vernon at the Skagit Valley Highland Games, then hit the Outlet mall and Kohls, then off to the Olive Garden for an adult dinner, and then down to Seattle for a Mariners/Yankees baseball game. We stayed at the Best Western in Mt Vernon and enjoyed our quite kid-free room, comfy bed and hot breakfast in the morning. We hit Bellisfair Mall on the way home Sunday morning and returned two new people ready to once again tackle the world of parenting.

Lazy Days of Summer

Mother Nature has finally given us some sunshine so we've been trying to spend more time in our little backyard. Kelsey has a little blow-up pool she likes to play in and we've been enjoying eating our dinner at our new patio table (Happy early Anniversary from Mom C).

Sisters

Our beautiful girls - Kelsey Shea and Everly Brooke...

6 weeks old

It seems Everly has changed considerably over the last 2 weeks. She's spending much more time awake, lifting her head and looking around. She's also started smiling (she's smiled at mom, dad, Grandma and Nana in the last week) and almost turned from her front to her back on the change table yesterday. Fussy times aren't quite as consistent or as long, but she is certainly most happy when she's being held. She's still sleeping in the bed with me, but we're going to start getting serious about getting her into her crib over the next week or two. She's still waking every 2-3 hours to feed at night.

At 6 weeks, Everly weighs 11 lbs 6 oz! She's getting rollie pollie - so much so I found rashes in her leg rolls! I'm now paying more attention to those areas during bath time!

In her swing

On her change table

Kelsey's hospital stay

Recently, Kelsey contracted E coli. We don't know where she got it, but it could have been the petting zoo at Queen's Park, or anywhere. She ran a fever for 2 days, and the diarrhea started the next day. She had major cramps with the pooping (1-4 poops an hour), would not eat, and couldn't sleep. We took her to the horpital on the first night because she couldn't sleep and we were worried about dehydration. They sent us home and said let it run its course. We took her to our family doc the next day who basically said the same thing. And the following day she was so lethargic, dehydrated and still pooping, we took her back to the hospital who admitted her, started her on fluids and ran some tests. Thank goodness! I had spent the last 2 days feeling that she had something more than a stomach virus, and was so worried that Everly was going to catch whatever Kelsey had. It was a reief to know someone was going to help us!

The staff and nurses in Pediatrics at SMH were so great. They were so terrific and caring with Kelsey - special stuffies for her to take home, any toy she wanted to play with, any movie she wanted to watch, popsicles, bubbles to distract her from the needle pokes, stickers, funny stories and songs! We felt very much at home, and although Kelsey felt so awful, I'm not sure she'll remember the hospital visit as a negative experience because she was treated so wonderfully there.

Eventually after what seemed like an eternity, the pooping has slowed and turned back to normal and the cramps are gone. She's still got a couple more blood tests to take (there was some concern about her kidneys after a urine sample containing blood and proteins), but after 10 days it looks like this illness has run it's course and that she's going to be OK. Not an experience I'd like to repeat. All I can say is WASH YOUR HANDS ALL THE TIME!

SMH staff using bubbles to distract her from the IV they were trying to put in

In her big girl bed with her sock monkey SMH gave her

4 weeks old already

Well, they say time flies, especially when you're in survival mode. Life at the Cressey house is certainly busy. Time for sitting still and sleeping well has gone with the arrival of our new bundle of joy.

Everly still sleeps for much of the time, but over the last week, she has become more alert and is staying awake for longer periods of time frequently throughout the day. She is still fussy between 9PM-12AM, and although I was quick to lable her colicy, I think it's just her fussy time. Some evenings are worse than others, and we definately get frustrated (this is supposed to be our time to sit and relax :)). But when we stop to think about it, things could be worse.

She enjoys being held and cuddled (and lets you know she doesn't want to be alone when you try to put her down) and she still won't settle in her bassinet at night. So, Jim's still on the couch and I'm in the bed with Everly. As much as I didn't want to do this (and feel bad for Jim), the more I talk to people, this seems to be a common survival tactic for many moms (especially moms of 2 kids). In a few more weeks, we'll start letting her cry more and see if we can't get her into her own room.

I am breastfeeding and doing so every 2-3 hours. We do have her on the bottle as well so Jim is able to feed her when I'm teaching dance. She took to it nicely and it hasn't messed with her breastfeeding. We're still working out the feeding kinks (like latching and engorgement), but I seem to remember this took a while with Kelsey as well.

She is definately putting on weight (she weighed 9 lbs 8 oz over a week ago). She's aquired a double chin and her arms and legs are chunking up! She's starting to look like a baby and is definately getting more cute. She still resembles Kelsey quite closely when she was a newborn. It'll be interesting to see how similar they look in a couple months.

I will be happy when we get into some sort of routine (if there is such a thing). I still feel like everything is brand new and I'm constantly questioning everything. But nonetheless, we're happy and healthy and livin' life!

Everly at 4 weeks

You are my sunshine

At just over 2 1/2, Kelsey has quite a healthy repitoire of songs she likes to sing. They range from Itsy Bitsy Spider, to If You're Happy and You Know It to the theme song from The Little Mermaid. She is very lucky to have a Grandma who enjoys singing, and Kelsey and Grandma spend a lot of time singing together. Here is Kelsey singing one Grandma taught her.

Big Sister Kelsey

Kelsey is very excited (maybe too excited) to be a big sister. She is always wanted to hold, cuddle, sing to, and play with her little sister (did I mention poke, pull and squeeze?). She has a hard time understanding that she must be gentle with and careful around Everly, and she doesn't entirely understand why Everly didn't come into this world able to play with her.

Kelsey has done fairly well with welcoming Everly into our family. She's a little needy for our attention, and has acted out a little, but overall she's done very well and the little bit of negative behaviour we've seen is to be expected. In time, I think she will be a terrific big sister.

Kelsey and Everly at the hospital

Kelsey and Everly

Everly visiting Kelsey in her bed in the morning

Kelsey and Everly cuddling with Daddy

Welcome Everly Brooke!

We would like to welcome Everly Brooke into our now complete little family. Everly was born on Thursday, May 20th, 2010 at Surrey Memorial Hospital by scheduled C-section. She was born at 5:21 PM, delivered by Dr. Caitlin Huckell and our family doctor, Dr. Elaine Jackson. She weighed 8 lbs 12 oz. She was chubby and born with a mess of dark brown hair. She resembled Kelsey at birth quite closely.

When it was finally our turn (going for a scheduled C-section reminded me a little of waiting in line on an airport runway), after getting bumped from 12:30PM to 4:30PM, our first surprise was Everly was a girl. We were convinced she was a boy, so what a shock to hear the doctors announce she was a girl. We had some trouble coming up with a name. Jim really liked Everly, and I thought it was different and pretty, so Everly she became. If she was a boy, she was going to be Tanner James, a name we had agreed on months ago.

Our stay at the hospital was enjoyable (if you can call recovery enjoyable), except the beds are awful! The staff at Surrey are knowledgable, helpful and very supportive. We stayed 3 nights. Jim stayed with me. A couple of the nights with Everly were difficult and we didn't get much sleep, but again, Jim and the nurses were great helping calm her down and dealing with the problem. The only "issue" was our baby doctor, who less than 2 hours prior, came bursting into our room after I had been returned from the recover room demanding to see the baby with the extra "pinky" fingers. He insisted it was our baby. I kept waiting for him to say "just joking - congratulations!" but he didn't. I had fed her in the recovery room and was trying to picture her hands to see if I remembered anything different. Nope! Didn't pay much attention, the doctor had just told me she was perfect. Anyways, after looking at her chart and talking to the nurses he figured out he had the wrong room and went off to find the correct baby with extra pinky fingers!

Welcome Everly! Mom, dad and big sister Kelsey love you and are excited to welcome you into our family!

More to come...

Jim, Everly and I in the operating room.

Everly in the recovery room

Mom and Everly in the recovery room

Dad, Kelsey and Everly in our room the next day (PS Kelsey is a proud big sister)

Everly going home from the hospital