Potty Trained!

We started puting "Big Girl" panties on Tylie about 4 days ago, and I think it's now safe to say that she is officially potty trained! I am BEYOND excited! I've been avoiding this whole potty business for a while, but I'm glad I finally buckled down and did it. She caught on pretty quickly too... The first day was the only day that she had any accidents! I'm so proud of my little Tyty!

Catching up to her sister..

Emma is officailly walking now! She started taking a few steps before Christmas, but ever since January hit, she's been walking all over the place! She still loses her balance a lot, but I know that soon enough she'll be running all over the house (just like her big sister!). I love watching my two girls play together... it kinda sorta makes me want to have more! But I'm definately not ready for that just yet. For now, I am quite content with these two little munchkins!!

LOVE THEM!!!!

Emma Update

I can't belive Emma is already 4 months old (although sometimes I feel like she a lot older). She is doing a lot of new things. She started rolling over around 2 months. After mastering that, she decided she wanted to move onto bigger and better things.... crawling! She gets up into the crawling position and rocks back and forth. She can scoot a little bit forward, but she mostly pushes herself backwards (and can get pretty far doing that!) I'm sure it won't be much longer before she starts full out crawling.
Emma is such a happy baby. She rarely crys (except when she gets immunized). She loves playing with Tylie and Tylie loves playing with her! She has about 3 naps a day in her swing (best investment we've ever made! she loves it and so do we!) She sleeps through the night in her crib. She is bottle fed, but she is starting to show interest in real food. She will start smacking her lips and drooling whenever she see's Jason and I eat food... only a couple more months Emma! Anyways, I'm not very good about writing things down when my kids do them... so I thought I would blog about it so I don't forget everything when it comes time to scrapbook!

Scary Experience

Last Thursday our family went through a pretty scary experience. We learned a lot from it, but I'm not going to say that I'm glad that it happened. Anyways, here's what happened. Jason was boiling some bottles late wednesday evening and had come down stairs to help me get Tylie to bed. The plan was to get Tylie to sleep and then transfer Emma from the swing to the crib (and of course turn off the stove and get the bottles ready for the next day). Well, to say the least, it didn't turn out the way we planned. Jason and I were both very tired and had fallen asleep. We woke up to the smoke detector beeping. We ran up stairs and saw that the room was filled with smoke (the bottles had burned down to nothing). I immediately went to Emma and took her and Tylie straight outside. At the time, I wasn't even sure that Emma was breathing, I just knew I had to get her out! Thankfully, Emma seemed to be ok. I was so frantic and still very concerned about baby Emma, so I called my mom and asked her what to do. She, of course, told me to go to the hospital and get everyone checked out. We got to the hospital and I couldn't even hold myself together. I was still in shock and couldn't stop crying. I remember thinking that I would never be able to forgive myself if my girls weren't ok. We were sent to Pediatrics and they put Tylie and Emma on oxygen. Emma got blood work done to test her PH levels. They were higher than normal, but the doctors reassured me that she was going to be just fine. I was still pretty shaken up about everything, so Jason and I decided that I would go down south to my mom and dad's place while Jason stayed to get the smoke smell out of our house. I'm so thankful for awesome family that has done so much to help us get through this. I love you all!

Looking back, I feel so blessed that we all made it out safely. We have 2 smoke detectors (one upstairs and one downstairs). The one upstairs never went off. I know that the Lord was watching over us that night. I could feel his presence every step of the way, guiding and comforting me through everything. This experience definately increased my testimony that God lives. He loves us and watches over us. He is happy when we are happy and is hurting when we hurt. He knows what is best for us. Trials come in all different shapes and forms, but I know that with the help of the Lord, we can get through anything.

Emma Grace DeJong

It all started at about 12:00am on February 20th. I was contracting about every 15 minutes, so I woke up Jason to tell him what was going on. His exact words were, "ok, go back to sleep". Anyways, as my husband slept soundly through the night, I continued to contract every 15 to 20 minutes. At about 5:00am I decided to go take a shower to see if that would help with the pain. After I was done showering, the contractions had stopped all together. I went back to bed, only to be woken up by more contractions. I tried to just put it out of my mind. I didn't think that I was actually going to go into labour that day. I refused to look at the clock and time the contractions, but I knew they were coming regularly. It had been way too long since we've been swimming, so we decided to go to the Bonnie Doon pool as a family. Of course none of my board shorts fit me, so we went to Wal-mart to buy some. When we got to Wal-mart, the contractions started getting stronger and closer together. It was at the point where I had to stop walking to get through some of the contractions. Jason and I debated whether we should just forget about going swimming and get to the hospital, but I didn't think the contractions were strong enough yet. Anyways, so we went swimming, and I'm glad we did! It took my mind off of the contractions, and the water helped to calm my nerves. While Jason and Tylie went in the hot tub, I decided to swim some lengths. I had to hold onto the edge at times, when I was having a strong contraction. The lifeguard asked me a couple times if I was ok, and I assured him that I wasn't going to give birth in the pool. After about a hour of swimming, we decided it was time to go home and get ready to go to the hospital. On the way home I had a craving for ice cream, so we stopped and got McDonald's ice cream sundae's... yum! Finally, after a mad dash to tidy up and get our hospital bag ready, we called Jason's sister Meggen to come watch Tylie. It was 6:00pm when we got to the hospital. They told us that there were no beds available and to go sit down. At this point, my contractions were pretty strong and coming every 3-5 minutes. I ended up labouring in the hallway for an hour before they finally sent me to overflow to be checked. I was 4cm dilated and in a lot of pain! I told them that I wanted the epidural, and within 15 minutes the anastesioligist was there to give me relief. It took him 3 tries to get the epidural in place. Once he finally got it in the right spot, I was in heaven! Thank goodness for modern medicine! After the epidural, my doctor broke my water to speed things along. She was planning to put me on the drip, but she asked me if I wanted to rest for an hour before she did (and of course I said yes!) I started feeling a lot of pressure and strated shaking uncontrolably. The doctor told me that the shaking was normal, and that it was just my body's way of coping. When I was 10cm dilated, I started pushing... and 10 mintues later we had our beautiful baby girl. She was born February 20th at 10:10 and weighed a healthy 6lbs 6oz. I couldn't of asked for things to go any better that day. Jason was such a great support and the experience brought us so much closer together. Welcome to the world Emma Grace DeJong!

Baby Emma is now almost 7 weeks olds and I'm completely in love with her. Tylie wasn't too sure about her at first, but now she is such a good big sister. She loves to help me take care of her, and she is so concerned whenever Emma cries. Emma has been a really good baby right from the start. She is starting to be awake more during the day and sleeps for a long stretch at night. She is starting to smile and coo... so fun! I feel so blessed to have had 2 healthy and happy daughters, and an amazing husband to help me rasie them!

It's a GIRL!!!!!

Ok so I know I said in my last post that Jason and I were going to have the gender of the baby be a surprise, but I just couldn't take it anymore! I had an ultrasound done and she's 100% a girl :) We couldn't be more happy! Now I can just enjoy the rest of my pregnancy, without having to constantly wonder if its going to be a boy or girl :)

Edmonton Valley Zoo :)

Last Saturday we took Tylie on her very first trip to the zoo! She absolutely loved it! Well she mostly just loved the animals that she could touch. They had a little petting area with goats, sheep, chickens, and a couple other animals. It was a lot of fun to see her get so excited... she didn't want to leave! She got a little frustrated with the other animals in the cages, and didn't quite understand why she couldn't play with them. Here are a couple pictures we took.. (PS. the massive bruise on her head is a consequence of having hardwood floors and a very active 1 year old! not the best combination... lol)

1st Ultrasound

I had my first ultrasound for baby #2 on September 21st! I was REALLY hoping they could determine the gender..... BUT no such luck. When I went to my doctors appointment to discuss the results of the ultrasound, they told me there was 2 things... #1. My due date has changed (the baby only measured to be 17 weeks). So my new due date is March 1st 2010. And #2. The placenta is low lying and, if it doesnt move up, I will need to have a C-Section. I'm not too worried about that though... my docotor told me that 95% of the time the placenta will move up when the uterus moves up.

So for now Jason and I have decided to let the gender of the baby be a surprise! Our next ultrasound is on December 10th :) ...This is the picture that i paid 15 dollars for!! lol I can tell its definately a baby, but thats about it!

Two for two!

Ok so Jason and I were shopping at Wal-mart a couple saturday's ago, and we randomly decided to get Tylie a "Big Girl"potty. We haven't really been trying to potty train her quite yet, but everytime i'm in the bathroom, I will put her on the potty. Anyways, for the past two days she has gone poop in her potty! Just before she's about to go she will make a grunting sound, and then she will look at me, point to her diaper, and say poop! lol it's too cute! She then ran to the bathroom and went straight to her potty! I was so proud of her! I hope she continues this pattern... the less poopy diapers I have to change, the better! Who knows, maybe I can have her out of diapers by the time the new baby comes! (fingers crossed)

Back to where it all began...

We are officially edmontonians again! Jason and I have a lot of great memories in Edmonton. After all, it is the place where we first met, fell in love, and got engaged! The big move took place last week and we are finally starting to get settled in our new place. Although I love Edmonton, I REALLY miss my family and how close we all use to be. I just keep reminding myself that I have a family of my own now and that this is just another chapter of my life. Jason will be attending the U of A for the next 4 years to get his bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering. He Started on September 2nd and loves it so far :) I know that school can get very stressful and intense, so it makes me a little nervous knowing that we will be having another baby this coming February. But I know that all things are possible with the Lords help and that He will be with us every step of the way.

My Baby Girl is 1 !!!

I can't believe it has been a whole year since Tylie came into this world! Time goes by way too fast! Technically, i'm just over 2 months late on this post, but i'm still getting use to this whole blog thing. Anyways, she got to have 2 different birthday parties (one for each side of the family). She loved stuffing her face with cake, but kind of wondered why mommy and daddy were letting her get so messy!

It seems like everyday Tylie surprises us with something new that she has learned. Lately, she has been trying to repeat the words that Jason and I say to her .... and a lot of the times she's successful! Some of the words she says are : Momma, Daddy, light, book, ball, hi, bye, uh oh, eyes, nose, no, poop (and points to her diaper), Lola (her Auntie Serena's chiwawa that she absolutely loves!)... and a few more. She definately loves to learn new things and gets really excited once she's accomplished something. She's always on the go! There will always be something bigger and better for her to discover!

We're looking forward to the years to come and are so excited to continue to watch Tylie learn and grow. We love her SO SO much! HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY GIRL!

Family Vacation!!!

This Past week we went on our very first family vacation! We went to Panorama Mountain Village in BC. It took us about 5 hours to drive there from Lethbridge, which wasn't as bad as we thought it would be (tylie slept most of the way). Originally we were going to have Tylie stay with Jason's parents in Brooks but, after much debate, we decided to bring her and make it a family affair! We would have missed her WAY too much and we thought that a week was too long to leave an 11 month old! Anyways, it was nice to get away from normal life and just relax!