Christmas in Midland

Yay for being at home for Christmas!

Highlights: Skating on Dave's pool
The 2nd Annual Ultimate Christmas Challenge at Dave and Christels (Congrats Rob, champion two years in a row)
Shopping with mom & NO children
People Person Present Gift Exchange
Finally getting an electric toothbrush in the Chinese Auction... (but it was one of the only things I forgot to bring home!!! Sad day!)
Sledding with Geneva in the backyard and seeing Bailey act like a little puppy again.
Watching the girls play and colour and sled and read books and chat with their beloved uncles.
Micah waking up only once during one night of sleep AND me getting to sleep in til 10 the next morning! (first time in quite a few years on that one!)
Celebrating Jesus' birthday with family!
OH, and I can't forget: Driving in a VERY crowded van with 3 Huismans and 4 Mulders, having no wipers and needing to stop 4 times... and arriving safely at the Nugteren Boxing Day Festivities!

The cousins meet! What a party it was. Eli has Micah beat in size, but their hands are the same size. Shoulda got a shot of that. (A fuzzy pic due to a slightly frozen cam)

The cousins

Happy Birthday Jesus! Not sure what the 5 candles represent... Oh wait, aren't there 5 advent candles. There you go, it was all intentional!

Aunt Christel's first time holding Micah. She and I spent a good bit of time together since it seemed Micah and Eli were on pretty much the same 'schedule.' They were drinking buddies all week.

The beginnings of...

One of the proud poppas of...

Leroy the 4th!
Last years' Leroy made it onto a very prominent spot in the Midland calendar; he's famous! This year Leroy was even bigger and better. Complete with handsewn mitten upon his right hand. On this pic he's not quite finished, no visible left arm/hand yet...
I even helped build this Leroy, along with Dad, Bri, Rob, Dave, and 5 different neighbours. Geneva helped a bit too. It was a true community event... Which took QUITE a few hours to make, and not quite as long to fall over. Bri and Rob almost cried when they drove down the street and saw a huge pile of Leroy rubble in the front yard. Too sad to take a picture. But at least he was built, the tradition was kept, pictures were taken, and memories were made. :0)

"Match!"

Funcle Brian

Brookie was going down on her own, backwards, you name it. No fear.

I was so excited to give Eli the crossstitch I made for him!

The whole fam!

We managed to prevent over-intake of candy and most of it remarkably ended up on the house...

Lotsa snow at Grandmas house!

Skating on D & C's pool!

Oma meets Micah.

My brother Rob made up this sweet collage of the many faces of our dear Brookie.... What a child.

Going back in time a bit here, but G had her first day on the bus just before Christmas break! Getting out the door is a little tricky with 3 kids, and since the bus will come right to the end of our driveway, G is a busser now! She was rather pleased and quite excited about her 'bus buddy' Sarah. What a big brave preschool girl we have!

Sleddin in comfort!

Early Christmas celebration

We celebrated "Dutch Christmas" with Derek's family, which is early Dec. We had planned to have an early family get-together so that we could still come and not be in danger of being in labour in the car again (as it went with Brooke 2.5 yrs ago!) but we, of course, ended up celebrating with a newborn instead! :0)

We left Sunday after church and were back Monday pm, so not a hugely long visit, but long enough since I'm still a little tired from the whole Micah-birth-thing!

Gr8 time spent with Derek's family. I think they rather liked our little man. So neat to see the kids' cousins, very cool too that it was the "first Christmas" for Micah, and his twin cousins Hudson and Logan. There's quite a size difference now, but how cool that they're all in the same year.

Uncle Rudy

Aunt Tina

Opa and Nana's first time meeting Micah


Micah's new hat!

Brookie's favourite present. A BIG Bailey! We're still trying to convince her to name it something different... She said it was Benny at fist, but now it's Bailey. Again.

Chillin' after a tasty meal!

Aunt Tina, Geneva LOVES her princess dress up clothes! They just happen to fit Brooke well too, and G is sharing quite nicely. They spent a good hour at Nana's on Mon am playing dress up and posing and twirling. How'd I end up with such girly-girls? :0)

Aunt Lori and Uncle Ed came by for a visit

Cousin Abigail

My mom dropped the girls off on Sunday afternoon: they had been at her house since Thursday. We were really excited to see them! Brookie's first time away from home overnight! My dad came for a quick snuggle with Micah since he hadn't met him yet! What a gramps: he drove 5 hours total and could only stay for less than an hour. So good that he got to meet him.

Grandpa

G snuggling and talking to her baby brother after a few days of being apart. I think she missed him a little bit! During this pic she was looking at him and saying "Hi Micah! Hi baby brother, I'm your big sister."

SO, anyway, in a way, it's kinda nice that we celebrated with family early. Now that Geneva's a bit older, it's been neat to help her understand more on why we really celebrate Christmas: the true reason for the season, that Christ came as a wee babe! It's been neat to talk to the girls already and tell them that Jesus came as a baby- just Micah's size! :0)
I've been teaching them Away in a Manger, which is rather cute. I'm kinda surprised Geneva didn't know it yet, but I guess when you only listen to a song for one month out of year, it's hard for them to remember it the next year!

Anyway, as a side note, this year our church is doing something called the "advent conspiracy" which has been really neat to be a part of. Basically, it centers around keeping things simple: worship fully, spend less, give more, love all. http://www.adventconspiracy.org if you're interested... It's neat to pick names this year, so we can use some of the "extra" money to support a local ministry and a global water project as well!

Tuesday was my first day back at home with all the kidlets. Derek was back to work and Geneva was at school, so Brookie and I had a nice quiet day at home with Micah.

Today was our first day at home with all 5 (!!!!) of us. Brookie was a bear, but other than that we had a good day. Here are a few more pics of our beauties.

Micah basking in the sunlight. Still a wee bit jaundiced. Our midwife comes again tomorrow am for a weigh-in, please pray that the little squirt has finally gained some weight! He was still 7 - 5 when Tonya weighed him on Tuesday... The silly little bean is just so relaxed and DOZY while nursing!
We're hoping that these past few days of quietness at home have helped him gain!
He is SUCH a sweet baby and has been such a blessing in our lives already during his 8 days with us so far! I'm TOTALLY ga-ga for him. hehe.

Daddy and Geneva went out to get a tree while the rest of the fam napped.

Setting up the tree. What big helpers!

OH Brookie.

Slightly better... We'll try again another time.

Ok, long enough post. Micah will be awake soon and ready to eat. And then up lots in the middle of the night wanting to eat and be awake. Again, I say: Silly bean. Please learn that darkness means NIGHT and sunshine means DAY!

Yes, I know, I'm impressed that I'm putting up more pictures too... hehe Just HAVE to show him off some more! :0)

.

I thought before I take a snooze, I'd send some pics your way. :0)
We had a great night last night, Micah woke up to nurse twice and went right back to sleep! What a difference it makes to have a good night's rest, as opposed to the night before when he was up and fussy from 10 til almost 3.
On Thurs, we had a bit of a scare when he was dry for over 15 hours with no wet or poopy diapers, but after our follow up ultrasound on his kidneys and and appt. with a pediatrician, he finally peed!!! YAY! :0) He's been filling his diapers like a champ ever since! And the ultrasound showed nothing wrong, other than a very full bladder and a slight blockage...

Derek and I are SOOOO enjoying our time at home with our little guy. We're laying pretty low. Derek's doing some painting (far away from baby, Mom, don't worry, with non-odour, chemical free paint!) We've had a few visitors, but nothing overwhelming, and it's just been a GREAT couple days at home. It's very very very quiet around here without the girls. Mom, you are WONDERFUL to take them for a few days. We're really excited to see them again tomorrow though, we kinda miss them. But we're glad you have sicky Brookie over there...

Feeling good, tired, but very good. I kept my hair appt. yesterday and Micah slept the whole time, woke up JUST as Lori was finishing up. Warning to family: It's SHORT. Don't worry Rob, not spiky short. :0) Love you all. ~An

Wide awake!

Not really diggin' the first bath at home.

Snoozing with ma

Our early Christmas present!



Big paws! Ok, they're really not THAT big in the whole scheme of things...

Enough already! Feed me!

Micah pics!

For all of you who aren't on facebook, here are some new pics of our little blue bundle. :0)

Things are pretty quiet around here right now... My mom's taking the girls back home with her to Midland for a couple of days... We weren't sure how Geneva would handle the news... She's normally excited to go to Grandmas, but I think this time it might be a bit harder for her to leave since she'll be leaving Micah behind. Yesterday she cried when it was Grandma's "turn" to hold Micah... Silly bean. She's rather attached already... Derek picked her up early from school so she got to have some good snuggle time before she went and they left without a hitch. Brookie was excited to see "the big Bailey" (my parents' dog, as opposed to her stuffed version)

Things are going great, we feel SOOOO blessed to have Micah in our lives and think he's RATHER incredible. I'm feeling good, but tired (of course!)

Our midwife, Tonya.

Mom came JUST as we were being transfered from L and D to the mat. ward.
So happy to see her newest grandson. Dad was oversees and is itching to meet him, as well as, I'm sure, the Huisman clan!

HOME TIME!

What a BIG sister!

Micah means "Who is like God?"
And really, WHO is? I don't think anyone could compete for second or even third when you think about who could have made a beautiful little creature like this. God is GOOD.

Micah and his sistas!