Aren’t they cute?  Emma, 5th grade.  Cooper, 4th grade.  Meg, 2nd grade.  The days, weeks, months and years are passing so quickly.  How do we slow it down?  That was probably the fastest summer I’ve ever experienced.  I had a baby and just had to keep on going.  Where was my down time?  It never came.  There was swim team and swim meets and five children to take care of.  It was really nice though having a baby at the start of summer.  The kids were very helpful with Max.  It was nice having extra hands around.  Max got pretty spoiled, which he deserves.

Here’s to another great year kiddos!

Maisy also started school.  Preschool.  I was debating starting her in school this year.  Was she ready?  Did I just want to keep her home with me?  Should I save the money?  After our first orientation day where I went with her for an hour, I was really worried.  She did great until they wanted to sit down for circle time.  Maisy didn’t want to.  She wasn’t finished playing.  I tried sitting with her but she kept running away and being crazy.  When it was time to leave, she didn’t want to.  Again, she wasn’t finished playing.  I picked her up to carry her out as she started throwing a fit and hitting and scratching me.  It was so embarrassing.  What a great first impression.  All of my girls can be challenging and stubborn and hard, but never for other people.  Maisy doesn’t seem to care.  I’m in trouble.

We decided to give it a month to see how she does.  Two weeks down and she has done great and really enjoys it.  Hooray!

Good thing she’s so stinking cute!

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August 12

 My first born son is 9.  How can that be?  Cooper is such a joy to have around.  The peacemaker of the family.  Lover of all things sports.  Kind.  Fun.  Smart.  Talkative.  Tender.  Sweet.  Goofy.  Funny.  Cute.

It wasn’t his year for a big party.  All he wanted to do was play wiffle ball with some friends.  So, last minute (as in the day before and the morning of) we called some friends and whoever was around came over.  The boys played wiffle ball at the park across the street.

While they were playing, Emma and I made a birthday cake and threw some frozen pizzas into the oven.

It was perfect!  Easy.  No planning.   Just what Cooper wanted and the boys had a great time.

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Maxwell Reeder Wise.  Born June 12, 2011 at 10:48pm.  Weighing in at 9 lb. 1 oz. and 21 inches long.

I feel like I waited a long time for this sweet guy to arrive.  Being my fifth, I expected him to come early and quickly.  I expected this to be the easiest of my pregnancies and deliveries.  Expectations ruined me.  This was the longest of my pregnancies.  I didn’t want to be induced, but when my due date came and I hadn’t had him, I couldn’t pass it up.  Who am I kidding?  When 38 weeks rolled around and this little guy hadn’t made his appearance yet I became extremely impatient and frustrated.   I think I cried every morning I woke up and realized that wasn’t the night.  I was dilated to a three by 38 weeks and to a five by 39 weeks.  Was I so wrong to think I would go into labor early?  So I decided to be induced the day after my due date.  I knew Max was going to be a big boy and that worried me a little.  I wanted him out!

The morning of June 12 I was supposed to check in at 8am.  But no.  Labor and delivery was too full.  Call back in a couple of hours.  Called back at 12.  No.  Still too full.  This time they told me to just come in at 2. Alph picked up our kids and Brig and I headed to the hospital and checked in at 2.  We then waited in triage for a room to open up.

Once we got into a labor and delivery room, we waited some more.

After two attempts at an IV, the nurse had to get the nurse anesthetist to put it in.  Third times a charm!  Finally at 5:45pm the poticin was started.  Again, expectations.  Thought it would just take a little and we would be on our way.  No again.  It took about 4 hours to get to a 7 so they could break my water.

More waiting.

And waiting.

More waiting with some pain.

Here my water had been broken and the contractions were coming on strong and quick.  About an hour of really hard contractions.  Katherine was there to talk me through the breathing and to keep the cold cloths on me.  I was so hot.  It was hard work.  Not fun at all.

Finally, time to push.  I felt like I pushed for a long time, but it really wasn’t that long.  His shoulder did get stuck and they had to push pretty hard on my pelvis to get him out.  Thankfully they got him out without too much trouble.  Man, it really kind of sucked!  It hurt.  I had done this four other times.  I was expecting the pain.  I guess I just forgot how uncomfortable it really is.  But he made it.  Quite blue at first, but he made it and was a healthy little, big guy.  The nurses thought for sure he was between 10-11 lbs because he was so solid.  Nope.  Just a small 9 pounder!

So good to have him.

He “pinked” up.

We heard his nice strong lungs.

Proud and exhausted parents.

The next day the kids got to meet Max!  They were so excited.  It was a little stressful though because I was in a shared room with a first time mom.  My kids are pretty loud and Maisy was not a happy camper.

Max marked his territory right away and peed on Cooper while I was changing him.

Maisy wanted nothing to do with Max that day.

On the second day, we got to go home.  I was ready.  Its not very restful in a hospital when they come to check on you every few hours and on the person sharing the room with you.  On different schedules.  Anyway, Max and I got ready.  He fit perfectly in his “going home” outfit.

Max had his eye on us!

The kids made a cute sign.

Everyone was so happy to finally have our Max!

Maisy even decided she wanted to hold him.

We feel so blessed to have this little guy in our home.  All the expectations that weren’t met with this pregnancy and delivery went out the window when we met this little angel.  Oh how I love having a baby in our home.  I think we have finally reached our Max!

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Maisy is definitely living up to her name of “Crazy Maisy.”  She is full of life and energy and spunk!  Would we expect anything less from one of our girls?  It is a good thing she is extremely cute, because sometimes she is quite the stinker.  But we love this little girl so much.  She is a lot of fun and makes us laugh.  She is smart and fearless and very athletic.   She is already doing front handsprings and flips on the trampoline.  Future gymnast?  She also knows how to work the ipad and download apps.  This generation is a little scary.

Maisy had been talking about her “purple,” and most recently, “blue” birthday for quite some time.  I wasn’t sure about the timing of it with Max being due so close to her birthday, so I didn’t want to plan anything just in cases (turns out we were quite safe.  No Max yet).  So last minute, as of the day of, we invited a couple of her friends over for pizza and cupcakes.  Maisy and I ran to the party store for balloons and a couple of party supplies.  That was pretty much all she needed…balloons!  She was so excited all day.  It was pretty cute.  Emma had the idea of making a “3″ out of cupcakes, so she helped with those.  It turned out pretty cute and Maisy was happy!  Done!  We did it!

Happy Birthday to my Crazy Maisy!

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Hi! This is Emma. Last Thursday I got wonderful braces! Not fun…

My dad has been very nice about it and called me a few hurtful names. For example ” metal mouth,” “tin grin,” “train tracks”  and “brace face!”

My first night wasn’t fun at all. The good part was that I got to have and ice cream/milkshake for dinner! Yum!

Maisy was so cute when she saw me. She said “Hey? Whats on your teeth?” “Braces” I told her ” I have braces on my teeth too!!” she told me. She kept asking to see them. It was cute.

That day I had to go to Meg’s baseball game at my school Walnut Heights. I turned around and saw my friend, Allison walking with her mom, Patti and her sister, Kaitlyn. She handed me a Jamba Juice. ( a smoothie )  How nice is that? Thanks Allison!

BEFORE

AFTER

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This year Easter was a little different.  Emma and Meg had the opportunity to go down to Grandma Kate and G Pa’s on Saturday morning to go to Talmage’s play, “Bye, Bye Birdie.”  They were really excited to go spend time with grandma and to have a sleepover.  I left it up to them whether or not they wanted to go.  They both really wanted to go, but Emma had some reservations about missing out on our usual Easter traditions.  Meg just said, “Ah, we’ll do them next year!”  So they went.  Talmage’s play was a hit and they even went back that evening for an encore performance.

In the meantime, Cooper and Maisy continued on with our usual traditions.

Dying eggs

Searching for the eggs the Easter bunny hid.  With no competition this year, Cooper found the “ugly” egg and got the $5.

All the kids got books in their baskets this year.

After church we headed down to Jeff and Katherine’s to meet up with the rest of our family.  We enjoyed good food, an Easter egg hunt and of course a little baseball.

I don’t even have an Easter picture of all of my kids together this year.  But here are some pictures of some pretty cute kids!

Easter was different and I did miss my girls, but it was nice to just have a little time with Coop and Maisy.  Rare indeed.

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Last month Emma, Meg and I got to go to Columbia, CA for a 4th grade field trip.  We went up on a Friday and got to stay overnight.  It was really fun.  Columbia is an old mining town that is still alive and running today.  We learned more about the gold rush (though Emma knows a lot about it since they’ve been studying it all year) and got to participate in a few activities.

Emma with some of her friends. Kate, Sydney and Maddie.

There were some cool buildings and structures in Columbia.  This was the old school house.  It was the first two story brick school house built in California in 1861.

The kids got to make leather bracelets and bookmarks.

Meg constantly raised her hand to answer questions she knew nothing about.  Finally, she was called on to use her big muscles to help pan for gold.  She helped pour the dirt into the cradles.  She was pretty funny.

They got their own horseshoes with their names on them.

They got to take a stage coach ride through town.

We even stopped in at an old Saloon a couple of times for a tall glass of sarsaparilla (which tasted like root beer).

It was fun to spend a little time with my girls, despite the cold and rainy weather.  It was also fun to see Emma having a good time with her friends.  Columbia will not be forgotten.  Mostly because we’ll be back next year with Cooper’s class (or maybe just Brig will go with his boy)!

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Maisy changes her outfits multiple times a day (like Cooper used to do when he was younger).  It makes for a lot of laundry.  I’ve thought of moving her clothes to higher shelves, but that would not stop her.  She would find a way to get to them.  In fact, her shirts are on a pretty high shelf and she easily climbs up to get them.  Where there’s a will there’s a way!

She has a style all her own.  Some of her outfits actually turn out pretty cute.  It’s all about leggins and skirts.  She wouldn’t dream of wearing pants, or heaven forbid, JEANS!  In fact, jeans are a threat if she has an accident at the gym because she doesn’t want to tell the ladies in the daycare that she has to go potty.  How sad is that?  Oh, and then there are her pretty black “dancin’ ” shoes, as she calls them.  They rarely leave her feet and boy do they stink!  She even likes to sleep in them.  I have to go in after she’s fallen asleep and remove them from her feet.  She also likes to wear her Belle and Mini Mouse costumes quite frequently.  Maisy is a lot of fun and always makes me laugh!

Here are a few of the outfits she’s thrown together. She has even learned to pose for the pictures!

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Maisy’s prayer tonight:  Heavenly Father, thank you for this day.  Please bless the food. Help us be obedient.  Thank you that we can have cake and cookies and princesses and parties and candies.  Amen.

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