we're alive

well, i don't really know how to blog anymore (or maybe even write).  if anyone cares, our blog is not dead, and i don't have intentions of giving it up forever...just no time recently.  i've got a good 8 weeks to catch up on, and i don't remember a whole lot of it, but it hasn't been roses.  in a nutshell, kennedy and blakely had the flu so brecken and i had to leave home so she wouldn't get it and be put in the hospital, brett had the stomach flu, brecken was dropped and it fractured her skull, she screamed bloody murder for a few weeks before we realized she was allergic to me (i.e. milk) and had reflux, and we got snowed in for 3 years.  yes, there are many details to this list of why the first 6 weeks of brecken's life were rough, and many emotions that have gone along with these details, but i'll spare them.  i can be wordy anyway, and oftentimes my blog has turned into the debbie downer of the blog world, so we'll say we adore our new baby, but don't miss the first few weeks of her life.  fast forward to now...

 

one good thing about being through the ringer is it makes you appreciate when things are good.  so, atleast for now, things really are good.  brecken is 9 weeks old and she is at the precious stage of smiling and trying to talk and sleeping through the night a few nights a week (and she's more precious on those days ;)).  i love her, but she's not the best baby i've ever been around.  mine and brett's genes create some screamers (and none of them have hair).  just some random thoughts to catch you up on our life...

- her name: everyone wants to know your baby's name, and when i tell them, they always say "what?  brackett?  bricken?".  no.  brecken.  as in breckenridge.  colorado.  "was she conceived there?".  good grief.  so the story of her name.  there's not really a good one, and there's not great significance to it.  it was really brett's pick because i decided when i was pregnant that i was done having kids and that he wasn't going to get his boy after all, so he could atleast pick the name (and no, we're not committed to that decision, but you have to tell yourself that when you're pregnant).  he loves skiing, and breckenridge was the first place he skiied, so he mentioned the name after seeing it again on a neighborhood sign.  when i was a rho chi, there was a girl coming through rush named breckyn (and i'm sure someone out there will read this and know her, so you can tell her a random girl out there saw her name tag and named her kid after her).  i saw her and thought she was beautiful and saw her name and thought it was cute.  i never even met her but remembered that, so when brett mentioned the name, i agreed.  i wanted to name her emmaline, so that became the middle name.  k and b call her "breck-a-boo".

- speaking of k and b, they are the sweetest big sisters in the world.  they ADORE their new baby...never a minute of jealousy or wishing it was still just the 4 of us.  they live to hold her and help feed her and "pet" her.

- and speaking of names, i think brett and i may should have looked up the meaning of names before we named our kids.  we looked them up recently, and look at their lovely meanings...

blakely: dark meadow or pale meadow (fine, but weird)

kennedy: helmet head

brecken: freckled

by the way, they all 3 show up under boy names.

- christmas: i still haven't posted a christmas update or pictures, which means it will probably never happen.  it was not a good christmas, and that's blasphemous to say if in my heart i had celebrated what christmas was really meant to celebrate.  i most definitely did not spend it celebrating a baby who was born to bring us peace and joy.  the decorations and gifts and songs and food did not bring me life as i wished them to.  why was i surprised?  we still took pictures to look like we were one of those happy little families in matching pajamas by the sparkling fire looking down lovingly at our new baby sister (whose neck was breaking)...

 

-i still look a little pregnant.  blakely asked me yesterday when my tummy was going to stop being big.  i tried to go shopping today to find stuff to hide it, but brecken hates her car seat, so i had to carry her around the store.  i tried to hold a shirt up to me to see how long it was, but i hit her in the head with the wooden hanger and she screamed, so i gave up and left and decided it went away with twins so surely it would go away with one.

- my rear view mirror has a new view and i love it so much.  i hate the sounds back there because brecken screams and k and b complain about her screaming, but i know "this too shall pass", so i'm trying to soak up the views because i know it won't be this way forever...

- these 2 still adore each other and still don't know the meaning of personal space.  i still look at them almost daily and wonder how the heck i got so lucky.  i'm already worried about brecken not having a twin because i've never seen a sweeter relationship...

- brett turned 30 and caught up to me.  k and b made him cupcakes.  i let them make them anyway they wanted to and this is how they filled the pan.  they were huge!

 

hope my long-lost blog friends are doing well!

my babies are old

guess who started school yesterday? well, maybe not real school, but 4 year old preschool. they'll be going 3 days a week, and though i'm excited for some alone time, something in me was a little sad that they won't be with me every day. not sad enough to not be ready for school to start, but sad. they're just so sweet and funny and i have loved spending every day with them this summer. it's so fun for them to be at the age where dinner conversation last night revolved around them filling brett and i in on their day...what they did, who they played with, what everyone brought for lunch. they really have turned into little people.




k has perfected her fake smile




b shrunk 6 inches for this picture?

i went and got a much-needed hair cut and i'm still trying to get used to it. he kept the length, but wanted to cut it for a center part. i've had the same part since i was 15, so it's a little weird for me. not to mention, my hair grows forward (weird i know, and the reason it's usually in a ponytail), which means a huge swoop good for side-swept bangs but hard for anything else. i know center parts are celebrity-esque, but i'm not exactly a celebrity so unless it gets trained fast, it's moving back.

baby #3 is doing well, but i must say i'm over the nausea. it let up around 18 weeks, but for some reason it's back and here all day long. i do love all of the kicking though. she moves more than kennedy and blakely did from what i can remember, and since there was 2 of them i think she's going to be an active little thing. i scheduled my c-section for december 2nd. our due date is the 5th, and my doctor wanted me to schedule for between 39 and 40 weeks, so we picked the 2nd because it's k and b's half birthday. with my birthday obsession, i also celebrate half birthdays (mine happens to be brett's birthday eve), so it seemed perfect. part of the fear i had in having another girl was that she'll never be part of kennedy and blakely's connection. with a 4 1/2 year age gap i'm sure they'll love and adore her, and she them, but no one can get in on their little world. i thought since they'll always have the same birthday and be celebrated on june 2nd, we could atleast celebrate 3's half birthday so she's not totally left out. now it's just a matter of making it to almost 40 weeks, which i really can't imagine. we had k and b at 34 weeks, so it adds another month and a half to the pregnancy. we reeeeaaaallly don't want another preemie though, so hoping to make it all the way.

hopefully life will slow down enough where i can get back to regular blogging. i've missed writing down memories to share with family and friends and look back on. more updates to come soon (hopefully)!

10 random happenings

1. nevermind on the clock idea from my last post. it didn't work very well. shortly after we tried out our new plan, i slept one morning until 8:30, which NEVER happens. if i don't set an alarm to get up and have some alone time before k and b get up, they're my alarm clocks, so i usually see early mornings. i felt bad that they had probably been awake for 2 hours so i jumped out of bed and called upstairs for them to come down. they asked me why morning took so long to get here and i told them that they could have gotten up an hour ago, but missed 7:30. "well mom," blakely said. "when mommies and daddies put clocks in their little kids' rooms, their little kids don't know how to read them." oh, i see. thanks for the parenting tip, b. guess we'll try that again in another year or 2.

2. we have more house projects going on than we know what to do with. i think i can most definitely say i'm officially nesting. we are in the process of:

- re-doing our backyard (which i think we can safely say is on hold right now. we started the project, then found out we were pregnant, so it's on hold for the sake of the inside for now. i'll post pictures of its hideousness later).

- wallpapering our half bath. i'll post pictures when we're done.

- doing the nursery (the ideas are all in place thanks to my very talented friend kelly, who also deserves props for designing our half bath and k and b's room...now we've just got to buy all of the stuff, paint, hang new light fixtures, and get everything in place.)

- re-doing kennedy and blakely's room. you might remember that this (along with wallpapering the half bath and re-doing our backyard) was on my new years' list. we still haven't done anything to it, and we don't want to do the nursery before their room and them wonder why this new baby who is invading their life gets a prettier room than they do. so now we have to paint their walls, re-finish their beds and nightstand, hang a new light fixture, and get everything up on the walls BEFORE we do all of the above mentioned work on the nursery.

3. did i mention we have approximately 14 more saturdays before our baby is here and all of the above projects (with the exception of the back yard) have to be done?! and many of those will involve georgia football so we won't want to be working? and we're not rich so we need to get creative to fit it all in the budget? ahhhhh!

4. i have started christmas shopping. our goal is to have all of our gifts bought and wrapped by november. we will probably have a scheduled c-section mid- to late-november, so if it's not done by then, chances are someone else will have to play santa this year.

5. i'm 24 weeks pregnant and starting to freak out about pre-eclampsia again. i'm not having any signs, but i know my chances of developing it again are higher since i had it last pregnancy, so i'm stuffing my face with protein every chance i get. and it's miserable. i hate eating when i'm pregnant, and could most definitely live off of fruit. i feel full all of the time already, so eating is only out of necessity right now. i wish it could be that way all of the time. why is it when i'm supposed to gain weight i hate to eat, but when it's time to lose the baby weight i'll have to work out 2 hours a day to off-set my love relationship with food?

6. we had family pictures taken again this weekend, and blakely proved her decision to be good starting when she was 4. she was an angel and posed for every picture. k was a bit of a pill, but you know one has to be off.

7. brett and i will celebrate 7 years of marriage this coming sunday.

8. k and b start school in a few weeks, and i think i'm ready. i had fun with them this summer and didn't think i would be, but i think summer's been long enough.

9. school aside, i'm just SOOOOOOO ready for summer to be over!!! i've been going through the starbucks drive-thru and ordering hot chocolate so i could pretend like it's fall. the first few sips make me happy every time and take my mind on a little retreat to the mountains. i can't wait for the weather change and football and comfort food and pumpkins and pretty leaves.

10. kennedy and blakely started gymnastics. i'll post pictures when i upload them. they're obsessed with learning it all and i'm obsessed with watching them. call it sad if you want to, but it's the highlight of my week.

hopefully i'll get some pictures posted of all of our random happenings soon!

ramblings and a clock

i think i've had writer's block for the past 4 months. i always want to think of some clever way to update you on our lives, but nothing comes to me. i'm 30 now. sounds like big news, but it's really not. it's been a fun month of celebrating so i might go through withdrawals now, but i felt loved and special, and i like my new decade. i know i've said it before, but i didn't love my 20s. a lot of great things happened...i mean i met, dated, and married brett, lived in 2 states, had 2 kids, and got pregnant with another...but to me, atleast in my experience, there's not much that's more refining than marriage or parenting, so the good things came with a lot of growing pains. besides, more than circumstances has just been this awkward decade of figuring myself out. looking back on it, i had no idea who i was at 20 and before. i didn't know what i was thinking or feeling. i hated those personality tests where you had to answer questions about yourself. i always answered them based on who i wanted to be. i remember doing one in high school, and i answered all the questions that i knew would diagnose me as "orange"...the fun, outgoing life of the party, because that's who i wanted to be. i knew it would be dorky when blue won and showed my ridiculous need for order and organization and deep relationships and alone time. i like being 30 because i know that's who i am and i know who god made me has been the basis for the way my life has shaken out. i know without a doubt i married the man more perfect for me than anybody in the world, and i know the way god made me is what drew him to me. i know the friends that i've walked through these past few hard years with are the ones i've connected with because of my make-up. i don't always love my personality make-up on paper, and i hate that when there's silence in a conversation i say dumb stuff to fill the space because i hate the awkwardness of it, and i hate that even if i saw one of my very best friends at the grocery store i would act awkward because it wasn't a planned meeting, and i hate how moody i am. but i do like that with age i start to care a whole lot less about trying to change my personality to be cool. i'm way more comfortable being dorky, and it's so much more fun that way.

really there's not much more depth to offer about my thoughts on life lately. i know i come out with random speeches every once in awhile about my latest revelations on life, but those usually happen when i'm not doing so well because that's when i'm forced into deep introspection and times of growth. pretty obvious why we're to count trials as blessings, huh? but right now, life is just good. i hesitate to even write those words because i know in 4 months, when our new little butterbean is here, i could be a psychopath. you know i didn't have the best experience with newborns before, so i'd be lying if i said i wasn't a nervous wreck. i've been fine up until now and could kind of pretend i'd never really have to take care of this baby outside of her living in me, but something changed when we found out the sex. i started to feel her move about the same time, and she became real and i remembered that she was going to actually come out, and i think i forgot how to take care of babies. i'm in a groove now with kennedy and blakely, and it's safe to say it's easy and fun and there are not many days anymore where i want to pull my hair out. there are some, but not many. as you know, blakely has been our difficult one most of these 4 years, but something has happened to that kid. she told me when she was 3 and horrible that she would start being sweet when she turned 4 and she did. she wasn't lying. we have had very few problems out of her since her 4th birthday. it just had to be her idea. we've had more problems out of kennedy, but i think that's been her adjusting to how to function when her role wasn't "the good one" anymore. we've tried lately to give her more attention so she can start seeing her value in other ways than good performance. i think it's going to be a lot of years of figuring out their dynamics as they get older and trying to parent them as individuals accordingly, but for now, i think i'm just in a honeymoon phase. i love to watch my kids talk and play with each other and can't believe there was a day i didn't like them. maybe it feels so good because the first 3 years were so hard, but i'm just in a sweet spot right now. not only are k and b sweet and fun, but pregnancy is good. i never understood people who said they liked being pregnant, but it's got to be because of this 20ish week mark. the nausea ended about 3 weeks ago and i only get sick now if i go longer than 3 hours without eating. zits, heartburn, and the uncomfortable hugeness aren't here yet, so i'm in that good in-between spot where i can still work out hard and do pretty much whatever i want to do, and sometimes i forget i'm pregnant. i'm trying to soak it up right now because believe me, i know what's to come and i DREAD it! i've never known misery like the heartburn i had at the end of my first pregnancy, then once the baby's here, i know it's no sleep for awhile, and then i get to create a new rug for my bathroom floor when the baby is 3 months old (for those of you who've never had a baby, or who's baby is less than 3 months old, get ready. the clumps of hair that fall out everytime you touch your hair are ridiculous. my hair's really thick and i really think i had a receding hairline). anyway, kind of like all of the lessons learned in my 20s, i know it's all for good and i'm excited for this new little life, but i know i better enjoy the bliss of these next 2 months before the hard times come. then again, maybe it was twins and won't be as bad as i think, but i like to prepare myself for the worst so i can be pleasantly surprised when it's better. for now, i'm just enjoying life as it is.

onto lighter things...we put a clock in kennedy and blakely's room yesterday. they're crazy early risers. they wake up at 6 or 6:30 most mornings, and they don't wake up and read books quietly in their bed. whoever wakes up first wakes the other up, then it's time for one of their concerts. they get on the stairs and sing, or come downstairs and talk reeeaaaallly loud. i guess they missed each other while they slept and have a lot to catch up on. it hasn't been a problem so far, but we realized that it's not going to fly when our new little one is here. i don't know yet what kind of sleep schedule she'll be on, but it will obviously be different than theirs and we're trying to start teaching them to be quiet and respectful while others are sleeping. anyway, brett showed them what 7:30 looks like on their clock, and told them that's when they get to come downstairs, and until then, they are to play in their room. they don't like this new idea. this morning i was sitting on the couch drinking my coffee and was entertained by their conversations revolving around their new clock. i think 7:30 is the only number they recognize so they were scared to death to miss it in case it passed without them seeing it. they must not have taken their eyes off of it because i heard one of them say something about "seven thirty" every 45 seconds, and every 50 seconds kennedy yelled out "i'm 'hongry'". when it was finally time for them to come down, blakely informed me that she wanted to come down at "that different o'clock. not that thirty o'clock. it took too long". i kindof like our new system and am excited about quiet and peaceful mornings.

have a good rest of the week and weekend!

it's official...

...the next 20 years are going to be full of drama and crazy emotions! it's definitely a little girl. she looks just like kennedy and blakely did in their ultrasound, button nose and all, and believe it or not, it made me excited for another wild little girl to follow her sisters around (and maybe be different and calm, but that would just be too weird in our house). brett already says he can't get a word in between me and k and b, so can you imagine!? now it's time to dig out the few clothes i have left over from k and b. i gave most of them away because i swore when i had 2 screaming babies for 7 months that i would never go through this again, so she may spend the first 6 months in a diaper, but that's how we roll with our babes anyway. as i write this, blakely is running circles around the house with nothing but her "hair" on, and just came in to tell me "guess what i just did? i stood up on the toilet to tee tee" and now kennedy just ran in naked and stood up on my bed to demonstrate what blakely just did. this little girl has no idea what she's in for!

four

i've wondered since i began this blog how i would mark another year of kennedy and blakely's lives. it's hard to sum up 4 years of life when you combine all of the memories with the crazy and indescribable way you love your kids. plus, i didn't have this blog the past 3 years, so i've never captured the previous years. in a nutshell, this post is loooooooong. it's especially hard pregnant because i pretty much cry over anything anyway these days; putting words to my love for k and b might flood the house. of course these are things they obviously can't read yet, but will hopefully appreciate one day:

four years of k and b in pictures...

first time i saw you girls (or atleast remember seeing you):


kissing each other goodbye in the hospital when it was time for kennedy to go home without blakely:


finally together at home:


how the first few months were spent:


this was our first family photo shoot (and last for 3 years) and the day we realized you would probably never like the camera. do you like how me and daddy posed and left you two on the ground to hang out? who does that? yall look fake. see, you weren't the only ones who had a lot of growing to do...


one year (and a hilarious depiction of your personalities then):


two:


three:


and now (most random picture ever. you look like caged animals but for some reason i can't find any recent ones of you together):


you both:
-spell and write your name and spell nicole and brett.
-write all of your letters but write most of your numbers backwards.
-love dressing up. if we're home, you've got on a princess dress.
-live half of your lives as though you're in the sound of music. i have to be maria more than mommy, and i definitely have a 3rd child named "fregrent".
-love fashion and approve of or critique my outfit every day.
-love to read with me.
-love family time. any time the 4 of us are together and having fun, one of you will look up beaming and say "we're having a family".
-never want to be apart from each other, and never stop talking to each other. never.


you both still:
-say "mama hold you" sometimes. it's the one gramatically incorrect thing i'll never ever be able to correct. nothing melts me more than the innocence of that phrase.
-let me have the whole hair cut budget to myself. and get really sad that your hair is not long like all of the other little girls. good things come to those who wait ;)
-won't wear bows in your hair.
-love and look out for each other more than i've ever seen in 2 siblings.

-love to eat and love to know what you're eating is healthy (your favorite nutrient is "fiver"...mama's girls).
-have to have your blanket to go to sleep and suck on the corners to comfort yourself. you turn the blanket around and around until you've wet all the corners, then go to sleep.


kenna grace,
i still can't believe i've only known you 4 years, when now i can't really remember my life without you. here you are at 2 days old. it had been a rough and scary pregnancy, so i was beyond relieved to have you here and healthy (though small and premature):


you stayed at northside for 2 weeks until you were strong enough for us to bring you home. here you are wondering where your womb-mate is:


you cried alot the first 7 months of your life, but after that, were pretty content and easy-going. here you are at one:


two...


three...


and now...


you love reading, dressing up, blakely, and being with people. you always want to know what we're going to do and who we're going to see. you can pitch a fit with the best of them, but when i give you a look that says "really?", you start laughing. you can't stay mad for long. you have the sweetest heart i've ever seen on a kid. you are a people-pleaser by nature, and so obedient. when you see someone hurt, you cry with them and long to protect those you love. i can't not smile when i see your big smile, missing tooth, and deep dimples. it lights up your whole face and your beautiful blue eyes. i feel like you'll always be pretty grounded, but i pray that you'll always know it's not your good performance that makes us love you. i'm sure we'll go through rough times like we already have, but no matter what, i will always be more proud than i can tell you to be your mom. i love you forever and always; so much more than i can begin to tell you with my words.


blake,
when i met you 4 years ago, you were the tiniest baby i had ever seen. you needed special care, and a month in NICU to grow strong enough to come home. i know we talk a lot about your strong will and fighter mentality, but i'm pretty sure god used that to keep you alive in the womb and out.



i still cry everytime i see this picture and remember how scared i was that you would never live a normal life. when i was pregnant with you, the doctors told me you girls would possibly die or have cerebral palsy. i forget about those long, scary days all too often and take for granted that you are not only "normal", but one of the sharper 4 year olds i know.

this is when you were finally big enough to come home, but still hooked up to your heart rate monitor...aren't you huge?!


this pretty much sums up what most pictures your first 6 months look like. i think we were too tired to put clothes on you.


you had a rough start. you had surgery when you were 3 months old to remove a hemangioma that was infected from irritation from your heart rate monitor strap. no wonder you cried all the time.


we made it through a year...


then two...


three...


and now we're here...


you still wear "hair" on your head, resist help because you like to do everything yourself, color in the lines perfectly, and are really, really funny. you're the leader of the pack with your sister and your friends. you put up a tough shell, but have the most tender little heart when you're broken. your heart is most revealed when it comes to kennedy. you'd do anything for her, and long for her happiness almost as much as your own, which is pretty rare at this age. i think you'll probably rebel as a teenager, but take really good care of me when i'm old.

blakely, i know we battle it out a lot. i know we drive you crazy somedays trying to teach you obedience, patience, manners, respect, and to one day know and fear our lord. some days i want to pull my hair out. but there's no one in this world who has ever existed or ever will that i would trade you for. because ultimately, though necessary to function in society and convenient for me as a mom, i don't want your obedience, patience, and respect. i want you and everything that goes along with you. i love you no matter how messy it gets sometimes. thank you for teaching me that you're really what i look like too, and how my heavenly father loves me in the same way, only in an infinitely more perfect way. i thought it necessary to perform and you've shown me how far love goes beyond that. i love you with everything in me, and it grows deeper each day.

happy birthday to my sweet little angels! i'm so proud of the little girls you're growing into.

picture catch-up

i've been bad not only about taking pictures lately, but transferring them to my computer as well. and while we're on this topic, does anyone know how i can make them show up bigger on my blog? i finally did it, so here's some catching up on our past few weeks through pictures...

k and b at their class party:



mother's day at my mom's:


we set up a slip-n-slide type thing in the back yard


licking the water off her face


kole freezing


laney


just had to

i hosted a baby shower for my friend teri. it was a small girls' dinner party with friends from college, and i loved having a small group for more intimate conversation:


my friend kelly let me borrow her stuff to create an egg and nest theme. she was an interior designer before becoming a stay-at-home mom, and has way better taste than me, so i love borrowing her ideas. (thanks k!)


see if you can spot the mud in our backyard in the back ground of this picture. more to come on that project.


4 of the 6 of us are pregnant. 3 know the sex and are all having boys. think i'll join them?!

i know summer's here because our living room floor has turned into a swimming pool. k and b put their "gobbles" on and swim on the rug...



then take an "underwater nap"...



does this picture make anyone else want to cry? my babies are growing up. we had to move them to booster seats to make room for another car seat in my car. they were big enough, and it's much easier, but i almost cry every time i look back and see a real seat belt instead of a britax keeping my girls safe. i'm not ready for them to turn 4:



and to end on, the ever-growing, humongous belly. this was taken at 10 weeks, but quite honestly i think this picture makes it look smaller than it is:



and coach's surgery went really well yesterday, so thanks for your prayers!