She's here!

Our little lady is here!  Ashley Kristine Meek was born Tuesday 11-22-11 at 5:08am.
It was a very quick delivery (4 hours from beginning to end).  She was 7 lbs. 8 oz. and 20 1/2 inches long.  Ashley has a head full of dark wavy hair and looks alot like her brother.

We came home from the hospital on Thanksgiving to a house full of people and good food. Grandpa and Grandma Meek, Uncle Kevin, Aunt Amy and cousin Grayson were all here to welcome our little girl. It was great to have the company. We are thankful that Grandma and Grandpa took Carter and Ryan back to Evansville with them for a couple of days so we can rest and spend some quality time with Ashley before getting back to real life.

The older kids seem to love their little sister already.  Carter is fascinated with her.  He loves to hold her and kiss her.  He is quick to give her his prized possession, Monks (his stuffed monkey), whenever she crys.  He says it makes her feel better.  Ryan likes to tickle Ashley, pat her head and give her kisses.  There hasn't been any jealousy yet.  Hopefully this is an indication of good things to come.

and the clock continues to tick....

I don't have much to update on baby #3.  We are 10 days out from our due date and I was hoping to have the baby by now.  I guess we got a little spoiled with Ryan coming so early.  I've had quite a few contractions over the last two weeks and even a couple of "false alarms".  On Saturday, we were timing contractions for two hours and several were only 5 minutes apart! We really started to think that maybe it was time. Unfortunately they fizzled out. 

All of these contractions and the growing struggle to be comfortable towards the end has made me a little grouchy lately.  It hasn't gone unnoticed.  Carter asks me on a daily basis if I'm in a "bad moot" or if I'm frustrated. I think everyone in the house is ready for the pregnancy to be over and for the baby to be here....well, except for Ryan...she is having way too much fun these days putting stickers all over my huge belly. 

Here's a recent picture of our 2 kiddos.  Hopefully my next post will show all 3!

Trick or Treat!

The kids were very excited for Halloween.  We picked out our pumpkins at the pumpkin patch with Grandma and Grandpa Meek and cousin Aidan.  Then we carved those pumpkins with Aunt Lisa, cousins Morgan and Mitch, and Papa Big over fall break.  Ryan was a huge fan of pulling out the guts and Carter liked picking out the design for his pumpkin.

For Halloween, Carter dressed up like a fireman.  We bought his costume in early October so he logged lots of hours in the outfit before it was actually time to trick-or-treat.  The costume included a super soaker fire hose backpack that he loved!

Ryan was orginally going to be a butterfly but Dad thought we could do better on her costume. We switched her to a pirate at the last minute. Daddy was right. The pirate costume was much better.

The kids enjoyed handing out candy to the trick-or-treaters that came to our door.  Carter was very generous in giving out candy.  When he was in charge of the candy bowl, I think each kid got at least 3 to 6 pieces.

Carter was excited when it was their turn to trick-or-treat.  Ryan was less then interested.

We were able to calm our angry pirate down and Daddy took them around the neighborhood. 

Our neighbors, Anna (3 yrs old) and her mommy, joined us in our trick-or-treating outting.  The older kids had a blast running from house to house.  Ryan enjoyed hanging back in the wagon and hitting up a very select number of homes.

It was a fun Halloween night and a great month of October. We hope your Halloween was spooktacular too!