The Daily Hailey

Blogging the way I did yesterday worked so beautifully, don’t you think? It was a fairly seamless process. It used a decent amount of data, but we were fairly ready for it, and as long as we’re careful through the rest of our trip, we should be able to make it happen! YES!

*****

We woke up to BEAUTIFUL weather and no wind!! I started the day with Laela, to go pick breakfast up for the family. Those little one on one walks are SO special!

As soon as breakfast was over, we headed off to the beach!!! Finally!! I have been positively aching for the beach! Aching for laking? Yup, going with that. And today is was finally time!

The kids did a lot of toe dipping before they wanted to go in further. Out came the life jackets. Except Ro really didn’t want one. So he agreed not to go into the water much past his ankles, and he kept to that.

They raced back and forth to the waters edge, filling buckets with water and filling in holes that Brady was madly digging.

(I did a ballsy thing and bought a couple of bathing suit tops for this trip while I was still super pregnant, and conveniently, both worked out to fit beautifully! This one is the most forgiving, obviously.)

They found rocks, a shell or two, and a few other treasures.

It felt like a dream come true for me to be back at the beach, this time with my baby. Last year, when we booked our trip, we expected to be here with a little baby in our arms. Jamin. Its obviously been a massive year, but we did make it here, and our precious Waverly Violet made the trip with us! I couldn’t be more thrilled to have her here, at one of my absolute favourite places in the world! My happy place is definitely happier with her in it!

Even this teeny tiny swimsuit that was gifted to us was big on her! I finally gave up and just let her be soft and nudey in a towel.

I’m so grateful.

We played and ate lunch at the beach, and headed back to our place for nap time. That transition wasn’t gentle, as you can imagine, some of the kids were pretty overdone. Dekker stayed up and zoned with some tv while the other four kids slept for a solid couple of hours. The long nap suited us perfectly because tonight was the one we had planned to take them out for supper!!

What is it about chicken nuggets shaped like dinosaurs anyway? They were SUCH a hit!

Our kids were super well behaved, and enjoyed supper. It was obvious that they were really hoping we’d hit up the ice cream shop after the fact, but I think we’re going to save that for tomorrow instead 😉 Instead, Dekker asked if we could “go for a walk in the breeze.”

So we did, and ended up back at the little side beach where the kids throw rocks into the water. So we did that!

And a couple of weirdos….

SO MANY of today’s pictures are courtesy of this man <3

Brady, I appreciate so much when you take pictures! I know you try really hard to think of it so its not always just my job.

Laela gashed her leg good and proper on the walk home, so I cleaned that out and bandaged her up before bed tonight. We had a nice little quiet moment where I was able to calm her and clean her up SO gently without hurting her at all. It reminded me of a time I wiped out hard outside of our church, and my mom took me home and took such good care of me. I remember being surprised when she said I was all cleaned up and finished, because I was still waiting for it to hurt. I hope to be just a fraction of the mom she was, and continues to be.

Everyone is tucked away for the night, and its soon to be our turn! If Wavy cooperates, anyway! She is some of the cutest company, I don’t even mind if she hangs out for a bit 🙂

It was a good day. I’m feeling considerably better than yesterday. We’re finding out groove.

After yesterday’s discouraging evening, I had a big cry and a super long snuggle with Wavy, which helped. Brady and I played hangman (no joke) for a while, where he made puzzles like “I will always love you” and quotes from my favorite movies, whereas I made puzzles like “Ikea under-bed storage” and “I have a barracuda in my pocket.” Just realizing, thanks to autocorrect, that I spelled barracuda wrong. Sorry, Brady!

This morning, my head is a bit clearer, and I discovered a way to gain five additional gigs of data for only $5.50! We hotspotted from Brady’s phone, and it only took minutes to upload yesterdays pictures onto wordpress from the laptop using data. I’m not sure how much it’ll actually have used up, and our data tracker is a few hours behind, but I’m hopeful that this will be an easy solution! The internet still sucks, but this method will make loading pictures possible!! YES!

That being said, todays post will be LONG, because it will include yesterday’s pictures!! WIN!

So, yesterday…

I went for a quick morning walk to the grocery store/bakery and bought everyone breakfast. The sticky buns are a family tradition back from when I was growing up 🙂 Our kids LOVE them! Brady and I got these magical pastries called cream cheese pockets. They’re exactly what they sound like, yes. I also bought coffee filters, because while they had them at our condo last year, they don’t this year. Its been like that with a few different things. I’m wondering if maybe the people who stayed in our unit before us just left a few things behind and the staff left them for us. Makes sense. We’ve got them now!

After breakfast, we headed out for a walk.

Anyone else’s kids need to carry a stick? Ours do!

It was a cold, blustery morning, but if you’ve read on other lake day posts, our kids are completely happy to throw rocks into the lake for a while. Plus, if you know me at all, you know I kind of love stormy weather, so it made for some wonderful, windblown pictures.

We wandered the town for most of the morning and made our way back for lunch. Lunch was probably the highlight of my day. We ate SUCH yummy food! One of the bonuses of having SO many leftovers from Wavy’s party is that we could bring TONS of it along with us here 🙂 I held Waverly and snacked while the little boys napped and Dekker and Laela colored and read books. After about 45 minutes of that, we clicked the tv on and the big kids snuggled for a bit. I LOVE when that happens!!!

After naps, we attempted to go play at the playground but we had a few unwilling participants…

so we headed home.

Once we were back at our complex, we accidentally stole toys from another family’s deck (whoops) and enjoyed the few moments of sun out of the wind that we could get. Conveniently, the people we accidentally stole from showed up and were loaded down with super social kids and really friendly parents. We ended up killing a lot of time with them in the courtyard as their kids passed Waverly around and asked about all of our other kids, where we were from, etc. When it was suppertime, their kids tried to come along with us, but we agreed to see each other again later. They’ll be here all week, as will we. They were a really nice family.

Hot dogs for supper, and off to bed we were. Well, first we fussed with the internet for a couple of hours, and then we went to bed.

*****

To today!!!

*****

Today was lower key, as if thats possible, haha! I took Dekker with me to go get breakfast, which we sadly have no photo proof of. But we know it happened 😁😁 because it was really nice! We walked through the trees and took our time. When we got to the bakery, Dekker saw something he thought he might like more than a sticky bun, so he chose a cherry danish, while the rest of us got our usual stuff.

After breakfast was when we came up with the way we’re (hopefully) going to be able to make the pictures work! So we did some research and made some decisions, and somehow, while we were doing that, the kids played totally happily together and didn’t go completely bananas! That was how we accidentally stayed in for the morning! It was actually so nice for all of us. While I’m sure the bigger kids would’ve loved going out and finding something to do outside, poor Wavy has NOT been enjoying the wind and cold as much, as she cried through most of our outside time yesterday, so this morning was much more her speed. She had some good wakeful time on me 🙂 She looks a bit like a muppet here, hey?

We had another delicious lunch, same as yesterday’s lunch, and then enjoyed some quiet time and naps. When everyone woke up, it was time to get out and about! The sun was out and the wind was down. We finally put in some good time at the playground! Good enough time that we don’t have nearby as many pictures as we normally do 🙂 Worth it.

This one is hard to see, but Ro is the little teal dude sitting on the seesaw, waiting for someone to come be his friend. This is his signature move on a playground 🙂

Popcorn chicken and fries is on the menu for supper, which I’m realizing is probably what the kids will order when we go out for supper in the next couple of days. However, the restaurant we go to out here has chicken fingers in the shape of dinosaurs, so naturally, they’re entirely different, and will probably be eaten with fewer complaints 😉 I remember, last summer, I ordered fish and chips, and randomly had a dino nugget thrown in there. The kids were SO JEALOUS!

The evening was well spent, as Dekker built big duplo creations, Laela and Rowan built forts behind the chairs, and Solly alternated between both groups. Brady played guitar and he and I sang together. Wavy rocked some tummy time that she didn’t even hate!

I kind of liked it too 💜

***** WIN for today’s post actually working out! This bodes well for posting photos each day!!

I’m sad to say my picture plan for this summer’s vacay has fallen by the wayside 🙁 I have some blog goals brewing in my heart these days, most of them boiling down to plainly putting in more effort, being a bit more planned and particular, and bettering myself and my work. I am incredibly discouraged this evening, as my plan to take awesome photos and post them each day of our trip isn’t going to happen. We have literally been trying to load photos all day. We were out this morning, and tried to load photos onto the laptop all through lunch and during nap time. We uploaded one successfully. We’ve had the laptop out virtually every moment we were inside with the kids, fussing with it and getting SO annoyed when a picture would load and load and load, only to error at the very end. Its wrecking everything, which I find so disappointing, as my family time and certain writing goals are all taking hits.

So in this case, the blog is being sacrificed, because OBVIOUSLY my family comes first. But I’m bummed. I wish I was more tech savvy and knew how much data it would use up to upload the pictures that way, but I just don’t know. I don’t know how much extra I’d need to buy, and I’m sure many of you know that going over on data usage is not cheap. So, we wait, and hopefully I’ll show you pictures another day.

Trust me when I say, its been a sweet day. The weather is far from perfect, with the biting wind hurting everyone’s ears and making it hard to be outside. Wavy is unsettled almost every time we go outside, and the other kids are going a bit stir crazy inside after all the talk of swimming, playgrounds, and sand castles. But the cinnamon buns are spot on, the neighbours are warm and loving, and throwing rocks into the water always wins. Our kids got a short chance at the playground today, which was a highlight, and they also found a game to play in the courtyard of our complex in a short window of warm sunshine. We brought all kinds of delicious snacks for lunch – muffins, pepperoni sticks, cheeses from Wavy’s party, and special fruit – which is a huge hit. Its ALWAYS a good day when the food is good, right?

Despite me being a Debbie Downer this evening, I’m sure better times are ahead. Today was a hard day of settling in, and I anticipate there are better days on their way as everyone rests up and gets more comfortable. I am truly sorry about the lack of pictures, trust me. For your sake and for mine. How I wish for my blog books to flow nicer, with less talk about the day before and more thorough content, even if it takes more effort. But this is all we can do at the moment without letting it ruin our holiday!

I’m going to give up on my tearful frustration now and snuggle the baby laying ever so sweetly on my chest. This is what family vacays are for.

We made it!! We made it to Waskesiu for the vacay our family has been counting down to for so long! We booked this vacation last year, when we had had SO much fun and couldn’t handle the thought of not going the next year. Everything looked so different last summer. We were pregnant with an entirely different person who we were expecting would join our family the following January. We had joked back and forth that, maybe I’d be in the early stages of pregnancy with yet another baby in time for our next trip here! As you all know, it was very shortly after arriving home from our wonderful, peaceful, healing time away that we found out we had lost our precious baby. What did we know? Not a blessed thing, thats what. It was awful. The last thing on our minds was calling Waskesiu and cancelling our trip. And its a good thing, because the timing of this trip feels just perfect. I’m so thankful to be here at exactly this time, with exactly these people. What a wonderful opportunity.

I’ll admit, I had a few “Why are we doing this again?” moments over the last couple of days. While I was incredibly organized and have been slowly preparing and setting things aside for a solid week now, there was just SO much to pack. Nine days away with seven people requires a lot of stuff, and while I don’t love to overpack, I’d so much rather not have to fork over a fortune out here for basic stuff just because we forgot. But guys, we’ve been here for about five hours and I’m already so content. Almost Wavy-level content, which is saying something!

I will say, however, that the wifi sucks so pictures are taking forever to load, hence the late post. But I don’t love always been so far behind with pictures and doing a big photo dump at the end of a trip, so I’m going to try really hard to keep up with them and accept that the posts will just be later in the days. Lake time, guys. Lake time has NO deadlines, haha!

Todays play by play goes like this 🙂

Everyone got up, ate breakfast, and got dressed. Dekker and Brady accidentally wore matching shirts.

Then we threw some fresh sheets on the bed in preparation for a friend, but the kids put them to use right away, because naturally, our fresh bedsheets were for their benefit.

I bathed Wavy after the kids had finished breakfast but while Brady was packing the back of the van. It was close to a tear-free bath, which I’ll take! She was probably happy with herself knowing she was peeing in my sink. But thats cool. Baby always wins.

Then I peed, and she watched me 😑 #momlife

I got Wavy dressed and ready for the day. The moment the kids saw her all fresh and curly, it was over. They touched her hair until it was solidly flattened again. What can you do? Prove it with pictures, I guess!

Our van has never been packed this full, but we got on the road around when we planned to with a bunch of happy, excited kids!! Poor Ro is SO hard to see back there, yet he manages to be SO cute still!

When we finally arrived at our destination, the owner wasn’t there to let us in. She was about twenty minutes away :/ So we listened to some tunes and fed Miss Waverly. She liked it.

The great unpack began!! The kids solidly explored the place before settling on the futon in the middle of the living room and getting their baby snuggles on.

Pre-bedtime walk, and the biggest fail of the day so far! Somehow, our first family selfie from our much anticipated lake trip does not include Laela! I’m so sorry, honey!! We LOVE you! But SO WEIRD how you’re somehow not in this picture!! You were RIGHT THERE!!!!

Our evening walk was short and sweet, and easily put out a few of our group. Wind has that effect oftentimes. It was a quick transition from outside to jammies to bed, and I’m ready to join the rest of the gang and snuggle in to sleep. But first, the fight with the wifi continues. And it could be worse, but I have a husband beside me, and a Wavy completely cashed out on my chest. I’m so content already, even with the wind and the chill in the air. Lake life isn’t really about the lake itself. Its about the atmosphere.

I LOVE it here.

I have solidly enjoyed this last week. It has been filled with good things, some of which were planned in advance and some shorter notice. Wavy had a really good appointment with our doctors. We’ve been counting down to the lake with the kids. We’ve gone to the city lots in order to gather up all we need for our trip. Things like that. But we’ve been humbled by the amount of people who have come over to our house to celebrate Waverly. I don’t even think I’ve mentioned each visit on here because they just kept happening! Its really touched my heart to know how many people have invested their concern and love into our family, and this morning was no different, as another friend of mine made her way out here from the city to snuggle Wavy, bring her a gift, bring the other kids some treats, and visit for a while.

It was during this mornings visit that I realized Wavy’s party was JUST LAST WEEKEND!!! I don’t know about you guys but it feels like it was eons ago to me already!! I think its probably because the lead up was SO exciting and pretty all-consuming, if we’re being honest. It was fabulous, but a LOT to think about! I went straight from party planning to lake planning, so I think the shift of gears is what makes the party feel SO long ago!

Cher took these beauties (and many others) for us last week! Isn’t she lovely?? Also Wavy… 😘 See what I did there? Its Cher’s birthday, by the way! Send her a bit of love!!

Regardless of how crazy it feels having Waverly’s party a week ago, we are officially in lake mode over here! Our house is a total mess, but I’m choosing to think of it as organized chaos. There are tubs and piles of things aaaaall over the place – in the kids closets, on dressers, on the island, the countertops, the beds, etc. A mess. BUT!! My packing list is exceptional, if I do say so myself, and things are getting done! All the clothes are picked and pulled out. Toiletries and first air stuff is coming along, and Brady has most of the bigger stuff (playpens, stroller, high chair, etc) out by the van, waiting to be fit in between the tubs we’re filling. Half of the backseat of the van is even removed. Its happening!!!

Four out of five kids are currently asleep, and Dekker is loving his quiet time playing Lego, as always. I almost don’t want to get up and keep moving, just for fear of waking everyone, but the show must go on!!

Gah!! Cannot finish blog!! Things I forgot to put on the list keep coming to mind!!!! Guys, don’t let me forget water bottles, or travel mugs, or duplo, or my bras from out of the dryer, or coloring stuff, or phone chargers, or playpen mattress sheets, or………….

We’re in full “getting ready for the lake” mode over here! Yesterday, I made Brady comb through my lists with me and make a super thorough list of what we still needed to buy. It wasn’t anything too crazy. Just lots of groceries, diapers, toilet paper, and a few things for Wavy, considering we have shirts that fit her and virtually nothing else! So we put together lists for Superstore and Costco, and another list of all the random stuff we needed from all over the place – Old Navy, Carters, RBC, Shoppers, etc.

I am SO thankful that we have kids who love running errands!!! That makes these days more fun and less overwhelming.

Superstore was pretty easy. Quick and painless. The toilet paper we buy is pretty expensive (we’re tp snobs) and it was on a fabulous sale, so that felt like a win. The kids were happy and well behaved, and thankful for their bakery cookies!

We quickly ducked into the bank afterwards to pick up some loonies for the laundromat at the lake, just in case. Someone tipped us off during our last day trip that they only accept loonies, so we’re ready! Very shortly thereafter the bank, we picked up lunch. Wavy slept through it. We kept rolling!

We scrapped a few stores that we were going to go to for something small, and ended up at Carters. I ran in on my own and found a few little wins for Wavy. She needed a hoodie and some bottoms. As you’d expect, I accidentally came out with a little bit more, but nothing too crazy.

Costco was last, and the most notable, for sure. Waverly was officially lulled and unhappy in her car seat, so I pulled out our carrier and wore her for the first time. I’ve been greatly anticipating wearing her in our new Lillebaby carrier that Brady gifted to me last year in amongst losing out little boys. I wanted it SO badly, and was looking forward to it SO much, and while I’m wearing a different person in it than I originally anticipated, I’m incredibly thankful and fortunate to have the chance to wear my little daughter against me.

I asked Brady if we would maybe need a second cart, considering the size of our list. Not only was it a big shopping day already, but we needed two boxes of diapers on top of it. He figured we’d be fine, and I agreed. We’ve NEVER needed two carts before.

Spoiler alert. We needed two carts.

We had the one cart completely loaded down by the time we reached the diapers. There was no room for them, obviously. Like ZERO room. So I carried one in each hand to the till. They laughed at us and said they could get us a second cart, which we accepted.

*sigh* Yup, guys. We’re there.

It wasn’t two FULL carts, but it definitely wasn’t one cart!

Lucky for us, by this time, Wavy was PISSED and wailing like there was no tomorrow. I tried to feed her but she didn’t want milk. She just wanted out of her seat. So she hung out with me while Brady did all of the legwork of unloaded groceries and buckling everyone up.

She clearly wasn’t even phased by our slightly humiliating first experience needing two carts.

Getting home felt good. Milk and a snuggle seemed to help the baby feel somewhat reassured…

and the older kids all got new water bottles, which they were AMPED about! We are going to have some VERY hydrated kids on our hands in the near future, because all they want to do is drink from them.

It was a very successful shopping day! We didn’t quite get everything, but we only missed pepperoni sticks and disposable bowls. Disposabowls? 🤔 👍 Yup. But we can easily hit Walmart on our way to the lake Monday morning and look for those things. I’m not worried. We’re bringing enough stuff along to cover everyone at Waskesiu Lake!

Wavy and I had our two week check up this morning. Brady and I were ballsy and opted to bring the whole crew along for the appointment! He used to come to every single appointment we had, but as our family grows, those rooms seem to get smaller and smaller. And louder! Thankfully, Dr. Guselle has always been totally accepting of everyone coming along, as is our student doctor.

The kids kept things interesting in the waiting room (why are waiting rooms so quiet anyway?) but thankfully we didn’t wait too terribly long before we were called back. Waverly was weighed and measured, and I’m so happy to report that she is growing beautifully!! At this point, they ideally want the babies to be back at their birth weight, but Wavy had crushed her birth weight of 7 lbs 14 oz and is currently 8 lbs 5 oz. She’s also apparently almost a full inch taller, putting her just a shred below 21″. Apparently she’s comfortably between the 50th – 85th percentile on her growth chart, which is mind blowing to me!!! She’s SO tiny!! But I’m super happy she’s doing so well 🙂 I, on the other hand, was weighed alongside Waverly, and apparently I’ve dropped back down to my pre-pregnancy weight. Plus lost an additional two pounds! Please don’t hate me 😔 I had someone actually make the “ugh” sound at me yesterday when referring to my size, and how she hadn’t gone back the way I did, as though accusing me of something. It felt crappy when I’d rather feel great. So that wasn’t my favorite. But I’m pretty happy to be back to size already, regardless of what anyone says.

Once we were all weighed and measured, Dr. Khatra came in and asked a long series of questions. He seemed to like all of my answers, and gave me good answers for the questions I had. I asked about Wavy’s tongue tie (Did I mention before that she had one? Its just little.) and the fact that her hands turn blue fairly often, but he had good answers for everything and I feel confident in them. We talked about my lingering reflux, low iron, and general physical recovery. We talked mood and anxiety and got some of that hashed out. I was pretty honest and said I’ve been having some anxiety, and we talked about factors that have played into it. I think we’ll reevaluate everything at our six week check in August 🙂

It came time for Wavy’s “once over” physical check up. He was SO sweet and gentle with her, taking time to just touch her cheeks and talk to her.

You could really tell he’s been working with Dr. Guselle because he did everything the same way, whether it was warming up his hands before holding her or going super out of order just to check her eyes when they were open or her mouth when she’d yawn. The less he “bugged” her, the better, it seemed. I held her a bit while he checked her ears, but she didn’t fuss or cry once. It was pretty great. She is just so content.

Once his part was done, he said he’d go get Dr. Guselle. He commented that she had been waiting for us to come and was excited to see us. She was lovely, as always. She went over some of the same stuff that we had chatted with Dr. Khatra about, just casually in conversation. Sleep, emotions, etc. She asked Laela if she was happy to have a sister and Laela simply said “Ya, I love babies.” You know she does! Haha! It was a super cute little chunk of the appointment. I could just shoot the breeze with Dr. Guselle ALL day! Wavy dozed through the whole second half of her appointment.

We ended the appointment on a high note, talking about the future of our family and whats to come. Not that we have some concrete plan (or any plan at all, honestly) but its pretty amazing to know your doctors support your choices and are excited to be part of whatever is to come. Like legitimately excited! I feel like Dr. Guselle gave us a good name in our clinic, and that Dr. Khatra just took her word for it and has liked us since day one. Thats really how we should be to one another. Just accepting from the get-go, if at all possible.

The kids eagerly ran out of the room with Brady and Dr. Guselle at the end of the appointment to get some stickers, and Dr. Khatra hung out and chatted with me while I got Wavy dressed and into her car seat. It just felt so comfortable and uplifting. I brag about my medical team a lot, but rightfully so. Not everyone can go to their doctor, with their entire family, mind you, and come out feeling happy and hopeful and supported!

Was a lovely morning 🙂 I’m genuinely anticipating our six week appointment!

You’ve probably noticed me whining about wanting a desk more than a couple of times recently 😉 If you haven’t, you’re probably not over here enough, haha! I’ve been REALLY wanting a desk to spread out on and potentially step up my writing, as well as hopefully just generally being more organized.

I pride myself on being pretty good at finding amazing stuff for a good price, and I’m not quick to rush out and buy something for full price if I can help it. This time around, thought, I was VERY tempted.

See, we’ve had this particular desk in mind for months now. Its from Ikea, its $110, and it matches these beautiful dresser units I have in our en suite. Its crisp and white and simple. It would go beautifully in our bedroom. Yet I’ve been watching Kijiji and Facebook Marketplace for the last couple of months to find anything that measured up, and nothing has really even come close. If there was potential, it was usually right around the same price, and in my head then, I figured I’d rather wait and get my “ideal,” which was this Ikea desk. The only other style of desk that I wanted was something older, maybe vintage-ish, with lots of character, because it would be the only thing like it in our room. But there was no way I could afford the cost that is usually placed on those items. I was getting pretty close to just buying some fake wood-look particle board thing for $20 while I waited for either the right thing to come along or to get to an Ikea. But even that desk didn’t show up for me! I’ve been getting impatient.

In case you hadn’t guessed from the title, it FINALLY showed up!! Not the cheap particle board desk. Not the trip to Ikea. But the beautiful, antique desk that will be more of an art piece than just a basic place to set a laptop and a notebook.

I found this beauty on Kijiji. The seller was requesting an offer for it, but also said they needed it gone fast. I messaged them and said I was VERY interested but knew I couldn’t afford the price of an antique. I asked for the ballpark value they were hoping to get. She responded back “Its up to you.” I’m always nervous to lowball someone, but she gave me nothing to work with! I wrote back “$40?” and she said “Sure, you can have it for $40.” Boom!

I excitedly texted Brady about it, and it turned out they were located just a few minutes away from where he was finishing up his work day. He willingly agreed to go pull out some cash and pick it up for me.

I helped Brady move it into the house and up the stairs. Its not that big, but its HEAVY! We estimate it around 100 lbs. I couldn’t resist playing with it as soon as possible, and was pulling out the drawers and checking it over the moment we got it into the entrance. It. Smells. GREAT! Very solid. Very antique. Definitely something I won’t even consider refinishing for a LONG time!! It is SO much better than I anticipated it would be. I couldn’t be more thrilled, which is weird, because its just a desk. But seriously, guys, I’m SO glad I didn’t bite the bullet and just buy out of Ikea this time. I love Ikea, but I love this more!

Now we keep our eyes open for a cool chair…

A couple of days ago, you may have seen that I posted a side-by-side picture of all five kids as babies! I tried to get them all around the same ago but was limited with what I had in front of me, so while it wasn’t perfect, it was close. Remember?

In order, it goes Dekker, Solomon, Laela, Waverly, and Rowan.

Did you get it right?

I quite enjoyed people’s guesses, both online and in person. Some did way better than I expected, and some bombed HARD. I thought it was worth noting that the kids aced it. Ro mixed it up a bit, but Dekker and Laela crushed the challenge. Dekker was very matter of fact about it, as usual, and announced “Well that wasn’t even hard…” The only mistake that was made pretty consistently across the board, believe it or not, was Wavy and Ro! I thought Wavy’s hair was a dead giveaway, but I guess the other similarities overshadowed that one detail! I get it, though. They look SO similar in ALL the other ways! Here is just Wavy and Ro.

I think Waverly looks MUCH more feminine, with her face shape, but those lips just get me! I LOVE those lips!!

Another very important picture needed to happen, and as usual, ALL credit goes to my girl Cher! She came over and graciously piled all the kids together in their jammies on my couch for their first official kid picture! And guys, it was AMAZING!!!

Aaaaand because they’re kids…

They did SO well, and Dekker was SO careful to hold her well, even when he was being silly.

I am so thrilled. Look at this beautiful family we’ve been given. I assure you, I do not take them for granted. I am consistently in awe of these gifts, and the honour it is to be able to parent them and hopefully raise them to be TOTALLY AMAZING HUMAN BEINGS! I’m SO thankful God is on our side and has given us this responsibility, and I trust He won’t let us mess it up too badly…

There were so many other beautiful pictures from this shoot but seriously, I have to parcel them out, haha! Can’t give away EVERYTHING on one post!!

Ok fine, just one more thing. For the first time, Rowan asked to hold Waverly. He was SO in love in that moment, I can’t believe Cher was there to capture it!

Ugh. Its like a punch to the heart every. Single. Time. I look at them. In a good way.

I am so anticipating more pictures of these five beautiful people over the coming weeks, months and years 🧡 💗 💚 💙 💜

Since Wavy came home, bedtime prayers have changed. Dekker thanks Jesus for SO many things about his sister that he often forgets to pray for anyone or anything else. He thanks Him for making Wavy so sweet and tells Him he is so excited that she came home to be with us. But I admit my heart breaks every time Rowan prays and asks Jesus to bring Jamin and Theo back home next. There is still so much to learn and process.

Last night marked two weeks with our amazing baby girl, Waverly Violet. I’m overwhelmed thinking about how fortunate we are to have already had her home for two weeks when so many people are still pregnant at this point! I’m SO happy to be able to hold her and share her with others, and to feel my anxiety slowly dropping. What an amazing gift she is to our family.

Cher came by a couple of days ago and took some squishy pictures of her with Brady and I. I hope it shows just how much we enjoy her!!

Ready for your pictures, Wavy?

That newborn startle is one of my favorite things!!

Her tongue is always out!

We tried to stick it back in. No dice.

Its possible we’re mean people…

Her hair is just SO amazing! I still can’t believe we got a curly one!

She was sleepy, post photoshoot, as one would be. “I’m sooooo tired from being a superstar all day long!”

I feel SO fortunate to have so much of Wavy’s life documented already! Cher, you’ve given us gift after gift in the last year, showering us with memories that we otherwise would have to count on only our mushy brains to keep. Every photo shoot with you, whether big or small, feels like a victory! Like a memory we didn’t know if we’d be able to make again. Like always, this last batch of pictures is just incredible! From the bottom of my heart, thank you for choosing us for this project, and investing in our family.

We love you!!!