Life at home

Life here at home has been relatively smooth so far. There is so much to tell you and I'll do my best to remember it all:)

We came home from the hospital Friday afternoon, after spending what seemed like forever waiting to be discharged from the hospital. Breven is so tiny, especially after our big baby in Noah that we couldn't get the straps in the car seat small enough so they would release us from the hospital. We ultimately decided to come home Friday instead of Saturday when they gave us our option, knowing that we would be much more comfortable at home than sitting in that small little room. 

Noah stayed the night with PJ and Lai to give us a chance to settle in at home and while we missed having him here, it was the right decision. I wear out so quickly that Noah's energy would drain any small reserve I had left from getting out of the hospital. I had a hard time getting comfortable, but Aaron was so patient in trying anything he could to help me get as comfortable as I could.

Noah came back Saturday morning and you could tell he was happy to be home! He was running from room to room and reacquainting himself with everything:) I haven't been away from him for that long and its amazing how much he can change in that short period of time! He is talking up a storm and we have decided he should be a commentator somewhere when he grows up because he tells you everything he is doing and what is going on.

The house just seemed so quiet without him here. And then shortly after he got back, he and Aaron left to go pick up Nonni from the airport. Unfortunately, her luggage made its way to San Francisco instead of here, so they took a while to get back to the house, but Noah told me ALL about it when they got back.

Since she has arrived, our life has been wonderful! She has been such a help and Noah has really enjoyed having her here too! Aaron has been such a help for me too...I have so much to be thankful for!!!

And Breven has been SOOO good! I am so spoiled, but he sleeps a ton, eats like he should and is a snuggler! I finally have a snuggly baby!!!! Looking at it all now, I am glad Noah was an independent baby because it has made him an independent little boy which will make his life as a first born to brave the unknown for his little brother just a little easier:)

I'm sure there is so much more, but for now, just enjoy some pics! I'm off to cuddle with my boys!

To welcome Noah home, Breven got Noah his own guitar. He hasn't put it down since he opened it!

Noah continues to find ways to be silly...

...and Breven's hiccups were cracking Noah up!

Quality nap time with Daddy

My boys...Aaron has been so good and juggling time with the two boys and making sure Noah gets all his energy out!

Breven's first bath...he hates to be cold-diaper changes always make him mad. But once we gave him something to suck on, he was fine.

Nonni with her new little grandson.

Hi! Meet my new little brother. He doesn't do much right now, but cry. Mommy and Daddy say he'll play with me later. I like to hold him. You should come hold him too!

Life in the hospital

(I wrote this while we were in the hospital and never got to post it. I thought it would be good just to document what life was like for us:))

Its been a quiet couple of days. Its hard to believe he has been here for 2 days already, but he continues to impress us and show us he is another go-with-the-flow little boy, just like his big brother was.

He has been such a sleeper. In fact, we have had to wake him up multiple times just to get him to eat! I have rarely heard his little cry, he is just so calm. He even slept through his circumcsion!

Noah has been by to visit both Wednesday and Thursday and its taken a little while for him to warm up to seeing Mama and Daddy in a strange room, but he seems to be doing well. 

Breven Arden Kalikiano Langness!

Emy, Noah and I are proud to introduce you to Breven Arden Kalikiano Langness!  He was born today, February 4 2009, at 7:25am.  He weighs 7 lbs, 13 oz. and is 20 1/4" long.  Both baby and mother are doing great.

We want to thank everyone for their prayers and thoughts for us throughout the day and this pregnancy.  God is so good and I am especially reminded today of how special that Father/child relationship is.  God is our Father and He has blessed as only He can.

My last day as a parent of 1

I know when my mom sees this title she will disagree and say that I have been the parent of 2 children for the last nine months, but for me...this definitely feels like the end of being the parent of 1 child. No longer can Aaron and I tag team quite as easily as we used to. And I have found myself thinking of all the changes that will be happening tomorrow. Its rather strange knowing that we were able to "schedule" the arrival of this child, but it has also made things a little easier ahead of time. All the laundry is done, the house is clean, the refrigerator cleaned out of old milk:)...am I forgetting anything? 

I thought it would be good to get down on paper the things I am looking/not looking forward to as my life makes a drastic change...

Things I'm looking forward to:

*Meeting this child

* Putting the face with what I have envisioned for the last 9 months

* Seeing Noah grow into his role as big brother and helper(he has become my official sock-

    getter when I get dressed in the morning...what will he add to that list?)

* Sleeping on my stomach

* Being able to go more than 5 minutes without needing to pee

* Being able to give Aaron a hug and not feel like I'm doing it from the next state over :)

* Getting down and playing on the floor with Noah and the new baby 

* Snuggling a new little baby

* Being able to wear all my old clothes again-it will be like having a whole new wardrobe!!

Things I'm not looking forward to:

* Such a big loss of sleep (I'm definitely an 8 hour person!!)

* The pain of the c-section

* The amount of time it takes to recover

* The transition time for Noah to get acclimated to the new baby

It seems the lists are as they should be. The list of good definitely out-weighs the list of bad.  Its exciting, nerve-racking, scary, happy and sad all at the same time. I'll miss the routine we have gotten into and how easy things have become, but I'm looking forward to all the fun this little boy will add to our family. 

And hopefully by this time tomorrow, we will be able to introduce you to our second little boy!

Mountain or mole hill?

And I thought there weren't any mountains in Indiana!

1 week left and Mr. Personality

Grey skies are pretty much the norm right now-but what I wouldn't give for a bright, sunny Colorado day!!! I was going through pics, trying to organize them and went through some pics of summertime and now I've got the bug:) Green grass, long walks, shorts and flip flops... But I keep reminding myself that God gives us winter to remind us how good summer really is and I definitely appreciate it more!

The baby counter's message on the side of my blog cracked me up today..."this week the baby has almost no room to move." YOU THINK!??!!:):):) My belly is definitely trying to tell me that its ready to stop growing and if all these kicks and stretches are any indication, a certain little boy is feeling the squeeze too:) I have really been enjoying feeling him moving so much. It hurts and is a lot more uncomfortable than I remember it being with Noah, but I love it all the same. To think that there is an actual baby in there just amazes me. Isn't our God amazing?!? Before I know it, he'll be out here running to keep up with his big brother and showing us that he can be just as stubborn as Noah too:) 

Noah is finding more and more ways to crack me up too. Today, I took a video on my phone and sent it to Aaron. About an hour later, Noah came up to me and said "take picture of Noah with phone too. Noah go get it." and off he ran. He came back with his play phone, "took a picture" of himself and then started pushing all the buttons on his phone. I asked him what he was doing and he said he was sending the picture to Daddy! I think he was trying to text. Thats definitely not something I knew anything about when I was 2!!! What a different generation Noah is growing up in.

He wants to be just like Daddy. I find that he has become Aaron's shadow anytime Aaron is around.

He is such a helper! He loves to help me make anything in the kitchen. We pull the chair over and learn how to count and dump and mix and make until something fun comes out of it all. Perhaps a budding chef?

And his shoe fettish is still thriving. He is constantly tromping around our house in shoes that are not his own, be it Daddy's slippers or flip flops or Mama's ballet dress shoes.

14 days and counting...

Its hard to believe we are down to the final weeks. I just got the carseat installed in the van, the room is as ready as it can be and all the baby clothes are washed. 

I'm in the process of trying to pack our bags for the hospital and Noah's stay with friends just in case this one wants to make an early entrance. Okay...honestly, I'm thinking if I'm super prepared, Poohba will take his sweet time in getting here and all our planning of family coming in will work out the way its supposed to:) I just can't believe its almost here. I feel like I just found out I was pregnant and in 2 weeks I will be holding my precious little one!! Those 9 months of pregnancy that God grants us are an eternity and a blink of the eye all at the same time! Its amazed me both times! But its good that God gives us so much time...we're barely going to be finished before he arrives as it is! 

I was thinking that January would be a nice, quiet month for us to just relax and enjoy family time. But it has been anything but. Every weekend has been filled with projects or people. Don't get me wrong, I have loved every minute, but its amazing how fast that calendar can fill up!  I think I have something planned for every day from now until we arrive at the hospital!:)

And I'm finally beginning to feel REALLY pregnant! I'm slowing down and everything is taking twice as long. Although, I do have to say that I'm proud of the fact that this time, I can still tie my own shoes!!:) The aches and pains of carrying this basketball in front of me are finally settling in and I can tell Poohba is running out of room since he's trying to find it in any spare inch from my bladder to my ribs and lungs! But I'm still trying to enjoy every moment, knowing that it will be gone before I know it!

Poohba's nursery

I have heard a lot of people asking for me to post pics of the nursery, but I've been trying to wait until the room was complete. Unfortunately, the crib is still missing, but hopefully within the next week, that should be up too. So, because I'm so anxious to show you too, I'll post the pics so far and then post one of the final completed room once its finished...Hope you enjoy the process a whole lot more than we did:) We're just glad its done!!!

So I was looking for a pic of the office before and I really don't have that many (who needs pics of an office!) So, you get one in transition mode. 

Everything out of the office and in its place downstairs. The work upstairs begins...

Aaron was a little unsure of the color at first but it grew on him.

While my parents were here in December, we taped and painted the stripes. Just when Aaron didn't think I could come up with anything more elaborate...I present him with this idea. It turned out amazing, but man was it a lot of work! (I think Aaron is VERY thankful there isn't anything left to paint in our house!!!:))

My mom even managed to match the walls!! Wait...where did she go!?!?:)

The stripes are all painted. I explained more about our agonizing process here where we ended up staying up until 2 am one night because we realized the 2 coats for the stripes had to be painted all at once.

Aaron spent much of Christmas weekend and many of the following weekends building the changing table. Yes, we already had one for Noah, but it will soon lose the changing table pad and just be a clothes organizer. We wanted each of our boys to have one that Daddy made for them. Noah was a big help in putting it together.

TA-DA!!!

And now its a beautiful, finished piece of furniture.

And the pic of the room as it is now. Now all we need is one crib and one little boy to fill it!!:)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, AARON!!

28 Reasons why I love you so...

1. Your faith

2. Your love for our kids

3. Your strong work ethic

4. Your willingness to help

5. Your faithfulness to me

6. Your brains

7. Your knowledge about so many things

8. Your willingness to help out friends

9. Your support of what I do

10. Your willingness to get up every morning to make sure Noah and I have food to eat, clothes to wear and a warm house to sleep in

11. Your knack for worrying because it means you care

12. Knowing when to hold me while I cry

13. Teaching me to laugh at myself when I do clumsy/stupid things

14. Your taste in clothes (and all your many shoes:))

15. Putting yourself last-i.e. buying both the X-Terra and Van when you really wanted a truck

16. Being silly with Noah

17. Giving me back rubs when I know you're tired and your back hurts too

18. Your love of sour punch straws

19. The safety I find when you hold me

20. Your willingness to paint all those stripes and all those rooms when I know you hate it so much.

21. Your need for symmetry

22. Your willingness to get down and dirty in parenting with me, instead of me doing it all

23. The fact that you understand me like no one else can

24. Working on all these projects when I know you would rather be relaxing after a long day at work.

25. The fact that you are secure in who God has made you

26. Your love of watching a good movie with me

27. The ability you possess to make something with your hands to pass down to our children

28. Your love for me!!

I love you, Aaron and I am so thankful God has blessed you with 28 wonderful years. I pray that he will allow us to celebrate for many more years together!! 

Happy Birthday, sweetie!!

Baby clothes

Boxes are coming down from the attic and the loads of laundry are multiplying....its time to bring out all of the baby clothes and gear.

Hard to believe its already time, but we wanted to make sure Noah had plenty of time to adjust and get the curiosity out of his system. 

And let me tell you...I'm finding all kinds of things in the baby swing, carseat and throughout the nursery. (pretzels, cars, stuffed animals, blanket and anything else that comes to mind) I could be spending a lot of my time in the future finding all those "treasures" that Noah will be hiding:)

Seeing all those little clothes and remembering another little boy who wore them makes me more and more excited to welcome our second little boy!

Hanging out as a family

My overall boys! Getting ready to shovel all that snow we got!! I think we got over a foot and its supposed to snow some more tonight! 

And he decided its not all bad to hang out with Mama too...although I'm a definite 2nd to Daddy:)

Noah was super excited to get this sucker. What's better than a sucker and book!?!?

Noah received this sweatshirt from Auntie Marlene and Uncle Mike. It lights up and he is in LOVE with it. Once its on, I have to fight him to get it back off!!

Noah knows where baby brother is...now to help him understand what's about to happen when baby brother emerges into the outer world:):):)

We're down to the final days...3 weeks left!!!

Rediscovering old friends and making sure they're okay for baby brother

Double take...

Working on one closet 2 years ago....

And on to the next one:)

Potty talk

So we aren't really trying to potty train Noah, atleast not yet. But we do have a potty chair in the bathroom for him and every once in a while, he asks to use it and sometimes we get results!:) The other day, I saw that look in his eyes and decided to ask if he needed to use the potty. He replied..."Nope, go check." and took off for the bathroom. I followed him, curious to see what he was doing.

He walked over to the potty chair, pulled out the little drawer and said "Nope, no potty." 

Hmmmm....looks like we're definitely not understanding the concept yet:)

Changes for a new year

So, for anyone who knows me, they know that I love change. I love to rearrange, paint, redecorate, reorganize...you name it:) And this year will bring many changes for our family. Noah will grow and change on an almost daily basis, we'll be adding a new member to our family who will grow and change just as rapidly. And who knows how many more changes this year will bring. 

So, to commemorate this new year, I thought a new look would be in order.

Project 365

So, I heard about Project 365 (click on the name to get more info) from a friends blog and thought it was a great idea. You take a picture every day and its a fun way to document the whole year. I decided I wanted to give it a try, but I would post the pics once a week. I knew it would be difficult, given that I would be out of commission for several days, but I didn't realize how hard it would be until I went to post the first weeks pics and saw that I had only taken a picture the first day! Woops! Looks like something I'll try again next year:)

Christmas, New Years and everything in between

Currently, Noah is down for his nap, Aaron is in the garage working on Poohba's changing table and I finally have time to sit down and do some more posting. We are still busy getting little projects finished and wrapping up the big ones. Hopefully we'll be able to enjoy a few quiet weeks before life gets turned upside down:)

Noah loves to help Daddy shed his outerwear when he comes home from work. And occasionally, it finds its way onto his little body. Looks like he has a bit of growing to do before he can fill Daddy's coat:)

Playing horsey with Daddy-a new favorite of Noah's

My big boy:)

Christmas Day

Mommy and her lovebug have so much fun!

Our family will only be this small for a short time longer!!

Noah is addicted to Guitar Hero. Every night when Aaron gets home from work, Noah asks him to play. He doesn't really play, but he loves to hold the guitar and strum.

For reasons unknown to Mommy, Noah loves to get himself stuck under the kitchen chairs.

I came downstairs the other day to see Aaron and Noah and found that N had made himself comfortable:) Who knows how long he had been sitting like this:)

This is how we go out to get the mail on really cold days together:)

My little boy is already learning all about safety

Our group for New Years (minus Noah)...getting ready to take a dip in our neighbors hot tub. Let me just say...Lai amazed me by running barefoot back from the hot tub in the snow!!

Pregnant ramblings

Its all about perspective. Its all about having that frame of mind that can be taught, changed and open to what God has to tell you. And man, has He been talking:) 

This has been such a hormonal pregnancy, you would think I was carrying a girl...but ultrasounds don't generally lie:) I don't remember being so emotional when I was carrying Noah. And while I am really looking forward to snuggling up with a new little baby, I'm definitely ready to shed some of the extra emotions. I've been finding myself in a funk lately and I can't understand why. I find myself ready to cry at more movies, a couple of songs, feeling a little lost and actually a little lonely. I know...you ask, how could I possibly get lonely with a 2 year old running around and I honestly can't answer you. I have no idea, but I am trying to use this as a time of learning what God is trying to tell me. 

I actually woke up in one of those funks this morning.  After wading through it for a little while, I ran to the grocery store with Noah to get some ingredients for play dough and upon returning home realized that things looked a whole lot better. There's just something about being able to run to the store for the things we need without having to wonder if there's enough in the bank, or watching the grin on that little face as he steers his car attached to my cart, or just the thought of making play dough the same way my mom made play dough when I was growing up.

All that to say, God has been showing me some good lessons. 

Number 1: I am relying to heavily on the things of this world and the people closest to me, rather than the one I should be relying on. 

Number 2: It doesn't take much to be happy...and its easy to forget that when I listen to all the media around me. 

Number 3: There really is something to be said for spending quality time in His presence on a normal basis.

Now, if only I could take these to heart and never have a problem with them again:):):):) Guess that's why its called a work in progress.

Vocabulary

My little boy is getting so big. His vocabulary is growing all the time. At his 2 year drs. checkup, the doctor was asking questions to make sure Noah was on track and he asked if his vocabulary was atleast 30-40 words...ummm...I think he has WELL surpassed that!:)

Old words that Noah used that are now sounding more normal....

*Helmo=Helmet

*Go-go=Motorcycle

*May-may=Fire truck, cement truck, ambulance

*Mah=water

New words he uses differently or favorite words...

*Mouse=mouth

*scoop up=scoot up

*dynamoes=dominoes

*Chismas tee=Christmas tree

*eith-air=either

*Helicope-tear=helicopter 

*eat whole sing = eat whole thing (so he's a little Asian too:))

*Barack Obama-at his birthday party, our neighbor Lori asked Noah who was going to open presents next...his reply-Barack Obama. (I guess we need to explain the difference between present and president:))

*die-pear=diaper (I think he's a little French:))(any word ending in 'er' is pronounced with a 'ear' at the end as in "tear a piece of paper", ex. straigh-tear, af-tear, shor-tear)

When my parents were in town, we were eating lunch one day and talking about how Daddy was at work. It came up that Daddy has another name. So my parents asked him what was Daddy's name. He replied "Daddy" And they asked him what his other name was. His answer "Aaron". They then asked him what my name was. He replied "Mama". They asked him what my other name was and in a much louder voice replied "MAMA". Emy is now obsolete, I guess now everyone should start calling me "MAMA!"