Big Brothers

Maggie

 A few more pictures from the hospital.  We only stayed for 24 hours (from when she was born).

Glad to be at home. 

Glad to not be pregnant anymore.

Colin and Daniel have been outside ALL day putting together a storage building.

Jackson has been helping.   Cooper helping also, on and off.

Charlie has been in and out.

Maggie and I have been hanging out.

My mom is floating around everywhere.

We baked some cookies together, and then prepared a fancy frozen pizza dinner.

 Thank you, Jessica, for the sweet blanket.

Check out that hairline. 

It's alot longer and darker in the back. 

Lots of light blond fuzz in the front.

 She's got peach fuzz on her cheeks and her ears, too.

She's quite kissable.

 

 I'm kinda in love with the little tuft of hair on the top of her head : ) 

Looking right at her daddy.

The jury is still out on who she looks like.  

 

So thankful for her.  

Meeting her brothers

The boys got to come up to hospital just an hour or two after Maggie was born.  My mom and brother had already fed them and bathed them.  They were very, very quiet coming in to see her.   Above you will see the "group shot."   At least I am looking at the camera. 

We're feeling pretty good this morning.   Nursing is going well, but as always at the beginning .... not the most comfortable and painless experience that the "breast feeding" people talk about : )  
We should be heading home later tonight.   Hopefully by 7pm.   My nurse yesterday and today have been wonderful.   My night nurse was terrible.   Machines were beeping, pain medicine wasn't ever brought, no one to help me to the bathroom.  I'm "letting it go" because we have a healthy baby.   But, I had a dream that I let the nurse have it.   Even though it's our fourth, it would have been to have some better help.   Okay, letting it go  : )
Maggie is sleeping peacefully; Colin just got back from meeting the painter at our house (it's  a good day to get our kitchen painted, right?); I'm about to go take a shower and recharge. 
Oh, meant to include in the last post - labor was a little slow.   My blood pressure was low and I felt pretty dizzy and lightheaded through most of the day.  Then, I went from a 5 to a 10 in a very short period of time (the same time that my doctor headed to Frisco for another delivery).  So, I was complete, but waiting another hour to deliver.   Maggie also had the cord wrapped around her neck and her wrist ... she was grabbing a hold of it.  But she was fine.   And the pediatrician said that she looked great this morning, too.   No heart murmur :)  and all of her fingers and toes are there.
More pictures to come soon. 

Maggie's First Moments!

 Margaret Frances Delaney

March 28, 2012

Maggie is here.  Whew!   She arrived at 4:48 pm.   It was a long day.   Didn't feel great through most of it.   But, she is here!   And healthy.   And tiny!   Well, she seems tiny to us.    7 lbs 15 oz ...
She's 20" long (when the nurse really stretched her legs) while all three brothers were 20.5".  

Jackson was the smallest (and earliest to arrive) at 7lbs 8 oz.   Cooper was 8lb 15.6 oz.   And Charlie was 9lbs 8 oz.     Give or take.   

She has hair - and a nice receding hairline.  Her eyelashes and eyebrows are really, really light (like Coop's) but she has darker hair.   The jury is still out on what color it is.  The front is really blond.   The back is a darker.   She has Colin's dimple in her chin.   And the tiniest, thinnest little feet.  
She's nursed twice, really well ... let's hope that continues.

I have to make a real effort to say "she."   Keep calling her "he" and Colin is correcting me. 

We just paged the nurse and she took her to the nursery for a couple of hours.  So, I am off to sleep, and will post pictures of the boys meeting her in the morning.   They were so sweet ... walked in very quietly and loaded with questions.   It's going to be interesting coming up with answers for all of Jackson's...  and Cooper's for that matter.

Will post more in the morning.  Thank you for the prayers and messages and texts ... all of it is so appreciated.  

Maggie is on her way

 

Get a good look at the belly.  

Liz is doing well.  Water broken, contractions intensifying, and epidural on its way.

We will update later today.  Thanks for all the thoughts and prayers.

 - Colin

Last Weekend of 5!

Last weekend we took the boys to a garden show here in McKinney.  We skipped naps.

 

The boys got to "dig" for worms, and then check them out under a magnifying glass.

Jackson was very excited and had to find every single worm in the pile.   Then pointed out which end was the head.

I can't believe that I don't have a picture, but the boys got to hear ALL about bees from the Collin County Bee Princess.   She knew her stuff.

Did you know that male bees don't have stingers???

So, then we headed down to Dallas for a birthday party.

They all slept.

Heading into the party -

for Quin, who is Colin's coworkers 4 year old son.

He had a Curious George birthday, and it was adorable.

So many cute details.

Cooper monkey jumping on a trampoline. 

 

 Pinata Time

 

 Checking out the loot

 

Charlie enjoyed the marshmallow pops.

Fun weekend!

 

Do Re Mi

The boys are LOVING their new piano.   Colin's parents generously gave us the piano that Cynthia's mother and father purchased when she was young.   We're all hoping that SOMEONE is interested in learning to play.    So far, so good.   They are all interested in making lots of noise on it.

5...4...3...2...1... Blast Off! Jackson's 5th Birthday

 

We celebrated Jackson's fifth birthday last weekend. 

It was very rainy here, so we had to keep it inside. 

Jackson has been really into outer space and planets lately, 

and was certain that was the type of birthday party that he wanted.   

So, we took the theme and ran with it.

Some of the decorations ...

Made this to put in the front yard, but it just sat next to the front door because of the rain.

We had given Jackson the Lego space shuttle while he was in the hospital.

He was so excited to use it for the party!

He and Cooper LOVE to play with.

I painted some letters from JoAnns, and added some stars.

Then pinned on some planets that I bought in a little mobile kit. 

 

 I ordered the invites from a wonderful shop on Etsy, Olive and Star.  

Broke out the cricut to make some stars and rockets ...

And we hung some inflatable planets from the living room ceiling.

We bought them from Amazon, ...

hung them  about a week before.

The boys LOVED them, and were disappointed when we finally took them down.

We had planned some activities for the party (it's funny how as they get older you actually need some more structure ... Jackson was asking through the party, "can we do something fun now?")

Anyway, we made the most of it inside - and just did what we could.

 

We had bought this at CVS around Christmas - I think it was $12 or $13.

The boys had colored a house at Mawmaw and Pawpaws house during our Thanksgiving visit, and loved it.  

 I had envisioned them all coloring it calmly, and playing inside as they did.

Pawpaw was called in for repairs after the birthday boy somehow tore off the front.

It seems that everyone got a little excited about it.

 

 

The cardboard shuttle didn't stand a chance.

 We had a planet toss.

Made some beanbags, and bought buckets for $1 at Hobby Lobby.

Inspired from Martha Stewart.

Adapted to the stairs : )

This was actually a hit.   Some of the kids got a little rowdy trying to get to the front of the line.

They loved seeing how many points they could get 

(not that they won anything... but it didn't seem to matter)

I stood on the stairs and tried to "monitor" the game by standing the buckets back up and yelling out how many points they got.  

It would have been easier if I wasn't SO PREGNANT!

The little astronauts also did sticker sheets.  

Found at Oriental Trading Company.

We made "moon rocks."

We were planning to hide them around the yard, and then let the kids break them open to find a surprise inside.

We did this for Jack's third birthday - as dino eggs.

What's more fun than swinging at mallet at a rock?

Inside: a super-ball with stars inside.

 

Recipe:

 2 cups sand, 1 cup flour, and 1/2 cup water.

You can also add food coloring.

Shape it around the ball (or whatever you want to put inside) and then let dry ... for days.

The final activity - a GIANT space shuttle.

Colin bought it at a little place down in Dallas near his work.

This is the "small" size.

They will custom make anything you want.

Had a hot air balloon made at Cooper's 2nd birthday.

Colin hung it in the garage.   Did you know that broken dumdums can create a REAL nasty mess on a garage floor?  It's true.  

But it was totally worth it.

All the kids took turns beating it.  Not even a dent.

So, finally the dads took some swings and we finally got some candy!

We handed out these shuttles as party favors.  

Not sure why my kids never have clothes on.

I took this a few days after the party.

We made lots of food, and Colin helped me come up with all the "space" names for everything.

Turns out that I had a lot to learn about the planets, etc.  

I don't remember much.

Just, "My very excited mother just served us nine pizzas"

in order to remember the order of the planets.

Jackson knows way more than me.

 

 Sweets.

 Planetary Popcorn.

We started to  make our own.  

Burnt it in the new ovens....

(becoming quite a trend here - burning things in our ovens).

So we bought some caramel corn at a little store near our house.

Cosmic cookies.

Shaped like rockets (per jack's request).

Used candy buttons.

Somehow in the move I lost all the rolling pin guides.

So, they weren't as thick as I would like... but they turned out okay.

Burnt at least 2 dozen in our darn oven.

Jupiter Jigglers.

Added some red dots of jello to make the "big red spot" on them.

I'm not a huge fan of jello, and jigglers are even more concentrated in flavor.

I tried one.   

They tasted just like the orange "glucola" you drink for the gestational diabetes test.  

(shudder)

The boys liked them.

Milky Way, Starbursts, and Saturn's Rings (Fruit Loops)

Mars-mallow pops.

Just very quickly (and messily) dipped them in red candy melts, 

and added some sprinkles.

Astronaut Icecream!

So yummy. 

I was so glad there were a few pieces left over.

Blast Off Brownies.

Drizzled some icing, added a few star sprinkles.

Planned on cutting out space shuttles, but my plan didn't really work.

And, Moon Rock Rice Krispie Treats. 

Light Year Lemonade, and plenty of beer.

As for "real" food, we had ...

Meteorite Meatball Sandwiches,

PB&J sandwiches for non-meatball eating kiddos,

Supernova Salsa,

Quasar Queso (don't ask me what quasar is).

 And Galactic Grapes and Nuts from Neptune.

 

I baked a cake.   1/2 yellow, 1/2 chocolate.

Lots of blue icing.

Some fondant planets and stars.

 Jackson wasn't so sure about the candles.

Actually, I think he was terrified.

Love the look of concern.

 

Love this boy. 

 

He opened his presents.  

Had a little help from his friends : )

We had such a great time, despite the yucky weather.

A little rain can't keep us from celebrating a birthday!