Mia JenNev Baker

Our sweet baby girl is finally here!  She was born on Aug. 21st at 9:24AM. She weighed 8lb14oz and was 21 inches long. 
Here are some fun pictures to look at, and if you happen to make it to the end you can read the story of her birth.

right after she was born

kids came to the hospital to visit..he loved her right away

Everything about Mia is cute according to Rylie.

first family picture

going home

only home for about an hour and he needed to giver her a lesson on the power ranger zords

pretty girl...her sleepy face.

Sweetie got her camera out

This is the picture Sweetie has with all the kids. 

one of my favorites

GG and Mia were bonding.  She was very engaged with her, it was sweet.

and one with PaPa

At 39 and a half weeks my doctor scheduled me for an outpatient induction.  The hope was that by getting the gels that soften the cervix that it would put me in labor...it didn't.   So two days later since I still really wasn't dilated and my body needed an extra push we did the gels again.  They were painful but they did help my body to start to have contractions so by the time I left the hospital and I was 40 weeks I was dilated to a "loose 3"  However she still had not dropped and my cervix was still very high.  So when I went in for my 40 week appointment I was feeling like she may never come.  They did an ultrasound to check to make sure she was still doing good and turns out that babies are supposed to do practice breathing and in the ultrasound they never saw her do any practice breathing.  It essentially told the doctor that she was ready to come out, so I was able to go back to the hospital to be induced.   So at 40 weeks and 3 days we went back to the hospital at 11PM and then were admitted to labor and delivery for Pitocin.  By 12:30 AM my Pitocin was started.  The contraction were not really that bad so I was able to rest a little.  By 2:30 I started feeling the contractions pretty strong and all in my back.  With in the hour I was miserable.  They also had to up the Pitocin which made the contraction even stronger.  Poor Devin was there all by himself with me, since my mom was at home with the older two.  Looking back I feel bad for him because he really could do nothing right for me, but I don't know what would have made me feel better...back labor is painful!   So at 6AM  they checked me and I was at a 5 and they allowed me to get the epidural.  I have to say I had a lot of anxiety about the epidural since the previous 2 pregnancies the epidural did not work as well as it should have, but I chose to get one anyway.  I expressed my fear and the anasticiologist was great.  He did an excellent job with the epidural that I didn't even know when he did it and right away he put me on my right side so that it would disperse well on that side and then I was flipped onto my left side.  I couldn't believe that the epidural was actually working for me.  By the time the epidural was in I remember looking at the clock and it was 7AM.  My blood pressure did drop quite a bit from it so I had to get additional medicine, but I felt great.   I was even able to rest for about 30 minutes.  After 30 minutes I felt a lot of pressure again and I could feel the contractions.  They weren't so painful that I couldn't talk but it was enough to keep me awake.  Also my body was shaking so bad that I couldn't rest.  The nurse checked me and at that point she wasn't sure where I was because she said that she could only feel the water sac and that my cervix was still pretty high, but she figured I was about a 7.  That was about 8:45 that she checked me.  At 9AM the doctor came it to check me and when they lifted the blanket my water sac and actually fallen out.  The nurse and doctor were both very surprised and said that its very uncommon to see that, so she showed me the water sac and then told me I was ready to push.  I started freaking out at that point because I knew my mom was only 15 minutes away and I really wanted her there but I couldn't wait.  So the nurse and doctor got all scrubbed up and at 9:00 I started pushing and at 9:24 she was born.   10 minutes later my mom walked thru the door.  Honestly it was a great experience and the best labor yet.  The other two were both soooo long and painful and this one was perfect.  Just enough pain to remind me I was having a baby but not so much that I was so exhausted.
Mia is a great baby.  She sleeps a lot.  Like 20 hours a day.  She is a great nurser and when she cries its not very often and its not too loud.  Seriously, a great baby.    She got her name from the kids, they named her after the pink samurai power ranger.  JenNev is my mom (Jennifer) and Devin's mom's name (Neva) combined.  We are so blessed to have her part of our family. 
We have also been blessed to have my mom come a couple days before hand to help us prepare and also stay a few days afterwards.  Devin's mom and stepdad also are here to help out for a few days.  The kids are adjusting pretty good.  They love her so much, but I think they are testing boundaries to see where they stand with us still.   We also were afraid that Devin wouldn't be able to be part of staying at the hospital but tender mercies of the Lord allowed him to be there and stay the whole time.   This has been a very special week and we feel very blessed. 

I love them....

 

This crazy week....

Here are some pictures from this past week.

The kids started school this week.  Rylie started on Monday but Ezra didn't start until Tuesday. So Mr. Ez and I had a great time while Rylie was at preschool.  We went to lunch, took goofy pictures and did the arcade.  Because of Ezra going to kinder full day, some of therapies changed..the biggest one was that Ms. Kristen who has done speech with Ezra for the last 3.5 years was not able to continue to work with him and our new schedule.  Therapist become part of your family, so it was sad to say goodbye to her.  Ezra also got new "robot boots" for his feet. Because of his toe walking it has had some affect on his muscle development so he wears these at night to stretch him out an hopefully prevent future injuries.

This is what you get when you leave your phone alone for 10 minutes... I always enjoy seeing what the kids like to take pictures of.  Ezra took the pictures of the peanut butter and of him self and Rylie did Littlest Pet Shop, her current favorite show.

My little girl is getting so big.  She loves going to school and looking pretty for school.  She also discovered this week that she loves photo booth props.  I'm pretty sure that every little girl at one point in their lives gets a comb stuck in their hair.. Rylie's happened this week.  I was so afraid we were going to have to cut her hair, but alas we were able to save it!

Ezra not only started kindergarten, which he loves and was oh so ready for, but he also lost his 3rd tooth.   He kinda has a lisp now...its cute.

This week marks the week that baby Mia will come...when, we are not sure.  I am on "call" currently to go in and have an outpatient induction.  So hopefully today we can get that done.  On top of all of that, Ezra tested positive for strep, Rylie has early signs of it, and I also am not feeling great...needless to say, its going to be a crazy week.  We are lucky that Sweetie is here to help us out, I don't know what I would do without her.   I will post pictures of Mia as soon as I can, so stay tuned :)

Some more randomness.

I found my sim card to my regular camera so you get to see more pictures of us! :)  Also, I added a family members to my account to send emails of when I updated..so if you are getting these randomly sorry, I guess I just assume you are interested in our family adventures...so enjoy!



These pictures include some 4th of July fun out at the Casino and bowling one night for Family Night.  Don't you love Rylie's pose. 
(p.s. if you want to see the pictures bigger, for those that aren't familiar with blogger, you can just click on the picture and it will make it bigger)

These are from Rylie's 4th Birthday.  Princesses on Ice came to town a week before her birthday so her and I got all dressed up pretty and went to lunch and the show.  It was fun having a day with just Rylie...she is a funny girl.  I can't believe she is already 4.5, where does the time go?!

Our public library here is seriously fun and does a lot of activities.  The kids really enjoyed Star Wars Day.  Unfortunately, most the pictures came out blurry b/c the kids were so excited I couldn't get them to stand still long enough to get a good picture.

Back in May Devin's dad came to visit us for a week.  We had a great time.  With him working in Afghanistan most of the year and the other part fishing in Alaska, we don't get to see him as often as we would like, but we sure do enjoy the time we do get with him.  Ezra loves to fish, he takes after all his grandpas,  this is a local pond that has pretty decent size catfish.  Ezra has caught a lot of fish in the pond.  Rylie likes to sit there and look pretty, the minute a fish is on her line she freaks out :) 

Swim lessons this summer.  Ezra was a star swimmer for his group.  Rylie was a little more frightened.  But by the end of this summer both of them were doing great.  Rylie made huge improvements.

just random pictures.   Ezra helped dad put Mia's crib together.  He seriously loves to put things together, always has.  He will be an engineer of some sort I'm sure.  Pictures of Ezra's preschool graduation.  He did 3 full years of preschool and the picture with him and Ms. Shannon is b/c she has been with him for all 3 years. I just love those pictures of Rylie.  It really shows her personality.  She loves to dress herself, so she is quite girly in that regard, but she also is a little tom boy too.  She loves to wear her baseball hat and take silly pictures. 

We recently went to the Ranch to go to my Uncle Jay's baby shower.   The kids loved the ranch, GGs house, the animals, running free, and learned the important skill of crossing a cattle guard with Uncle Jayson. :)

The Power Ranger Baby

So Devin and I have always known that we wanted to expand our family...but what we didn't always see eye to eye on was timing.  With Ezra and Rylie only being 16.5 months apart I knew that I wanted a "break"  Then as the kids got older and we realized how much attention they needed I was certain that a break was the best thing to do.  When Ezra was first diagnosed with autism we knew that we would have a busier schedule than normal but we had no idea what it would really entitle.   Since Ezra was 18 months old we have had therapies in our home.  It started off with speech, then OT was added to it.  Then he went to preschool and we qualified for long term care which allowed us to continue speech and OT but in addition we all received one on one hab.  So at 3 years old Ezra was going to preschool 12 hours a week and at preschool he had a very specific IEP that included therapies.  At home he was receiving 1 hour a week of Speech, 1 hour a week of OT and about 15 hours a week of hab.  Most of it was with the state long term care but 7 hours a week we were very blessed to have our private insurance pay for his ABA program with a BCBA.  This is huge, insurance companies just don't pay for it, but military insurance does.  And to this day I know that Ezra wouldn't be where he is today if it wasn't for all the intensive therapy and great people we have worked with.  In the midst of all of this when Rylie turned 18 months old we realized she was not talking either.  So back to AZ early intervention and sure enough she qualified too for speech.  So between the two kids, needless to say our lives revolved around therapy.   So when we talked about getting pregnant again, as much as I wanted to have kids closer in age, I knew we needed to wait until the two we had were in a better place developmentally so that I could continue to give them my 100% focus on their needs.   Both of them are doing great.  Both are still receiving therapy, but are doing well enough that finally I felt the time was right again to get pregnant.  

Devin left in October for Qatar for a small deployment.  2 weeks after he left he received an email with the following picture (below)  That was a shocker!

 I wanted the kids to be super excited about the baby. Sometimes Ezra has a hard time with abstract things, so we decided to find out the sex of the baby to help them grasp it better.  When I went in for the ultrasound Devin couldn't be there with me and I didn't want to find out by myself so I had the technician write the sex down on a piece of paper. I gave the results to my friend (and I didn't peak) She then prepared a box for us.  This is how the kids found out...

 

 A girl!!!

 

 We also had a friend make us cupcakes and put the frosting in the middle to reveal what we were having.

 

 

 I wish I could remember how many weeks I am in these pictures, but I believe here I am 16 weeks.

 She would cover her face in every ultra sound that I ended up having to go to a specialist  to get clearer pictures of her face... 4 times we tried!

 18 weeks...this shirt hid my belly well :)

 I want to say i'm about 22 weeks here

about 28 weeks here....  I guess its time to take another picture.

 

You might be wondering why I titled this post the power ranger baby.  Well that is because when Devin and I couldn't decide on a name for her we decided to let the kids choose the name.   Both of them agreed and decided at the same time we should name her Mia after the pink power ranger.   To be honest with you I didn't love the name Mia for awhile, but the more we refer to her as Mia I can't picture her being named anything else.  So Mia JenNev (after her grandmas Jennifer and Neva) Baker will be making her debut into this world in less than 2 weeks! We are very excited and a little nervous too... Rylie is 4.5 years old, its been awhile since I've had a baby around.

Where to begin

It has been well over a year since I last posted, that I'm not even sure where to start. Some told me to just start from today and go forward, others suggested going back.... ahhh, what to do?!  I think I will just post pictures from last year and do as much as a catch up as I can :)  And then when I find  my memory card to my camera (the pictures I will post tonight will be from my phone)  I will do another "catch up" post.   The thing is I have really wanted to get back to blogging.  Its my best form of journaling (pathetic, I know) and although I'm sure everyone on FB loves to hear about everything, I don't think I want everyone on FB to hear about everything. So, I hope to use my blog as a journal, where I can feel comfortable posting all the pictures I want and any updates of our family I want.  When I do that on FB it just makes me feel weird, and I feel like I'm losing important memories by not putting it somewhere.

 Last year for Christa's wedding we finally made it back to Alaska for the first time in 5 years.  It was great and there was a small part of me that actually missed Alaska (shh...don't tell Devin's dad ;) )  The kids loved it up there and seeing their cousin Wesley.  I wish we could afford to go back more often, especially in the summers, while we are dying of heat here in AZ.

 This picture came out blurry of course!   I remember this day getting ready for church just being in awe of how cute they looked and realizing that they are mine!  I love these two and as much as they keep me on my toes, I wouldn't change it for anything.

 Playing outside.  This was last year.  This year, before Devin deployed to Qatar we planted grass.  I wanted them to have a yard that they could go outside and play in.  The grass is already dead :(  Its hard to maintain grass in Arizona during the summertime.  This summer we got up to 118 for 2 days in a row and then stayed around 115 for several days afterwards!

Playing Puss-N-Boots.  I really just love how well they play together and how much fun they have pretending.

 Then there was the time that Rylie looked like Angelina Jolie.  Poor thing!  This was during the Holidays while Devin was deployed.  She had been running a fever but not severe.  She woke me up in the middle of the night saying her face hurt, but I almost sent her back to bed.  Instead I turned on the light and I'm glad I did...her lips were huge!   Luckily since Devin was gone I have great friends here I was able to take her to the ER in the middle of the night and drop Ezra off at Corynn's house. Turns out she had strep throat...who knew that swollen lips was a sign?

 This is my awesome Pac Man cake that Corynn made for me for my 30th birthday.  I will have to track down more pictures of that event.  She did a great job with my 80s inspired birthday party since Devin was still gone.  It was a lot of fun.  I was having a lot of morning sickness at the time so I'm glad she forced me to be social on my big 30.

 Ezra lost his first tooth back in March of this year.   We were up in Utah for Ethan and Courtney's wedding (again, need to track down more pictures of that)  It was quite exciting for him and scary.  He lost the second tooth about 5 days later.   My little boy is growing up.

 Part of our trip home from Utah was stopping at Hoover Dam. Not the best picture of me, why do I always end of being the one taking the picture and not the one in the middle :)

 Something that I have done the last 3 years is spoil myself with pedicures, about every 3 months.  I love them!   Turns out you can have them paint kids nails and only charge $5.  So now its something that me and Rylie do together. We love to go paint our nails.  She is quite the diva while we are there.

 oh yeah, we are having a baby... Oh, and its a girl.   I'm due in less than 2 weeks at this point!  The kids were beyond excited to find out what were having and still are.  I will do a much better post on this soon. 

 We did manage to get out and go up to the Cabin this year.  Its so peaceful and beautiful up there.  I'm glad that my grandparents have the cabin for us to visit. Ezra is in his element while up there...and Rylie too.  I hope that we take more advantage of it more often.

 

 Mothers day this year.  I have been craving a lot more salty than sweet this pregnancy and I'm pretty sure there was at least a month straight were all I wanted was hoagie sandwiches... yummy!  

 Last day of preschool for the kids.  Ezra will be in kindergarten in "two more sleeps" and Rylie has one more year of preschool before kindergarten.  I loved that they got to go to school together and be in preschool together.  I always knew who was good and bad during the day :)  

 

 not the best picture of Devin...but we don't have many of us together so I am posting it anyway!  Neva and Scott came to visit the beginning of the summer. They were a huge help in preparing for baby.  We cleaned out the garage, went through all our baby stuff, organized the office...cleaned and then cleaned some more.  As a reward of all our hard work we decided to go stay at a nice resort for the last 2 days they were here.  It was perfect and crazy all at the same time :)  

 Neva making the kids act like a statue...????

 Then we went to Sweeties for a week.  The kids have a very special bond with Sweetie. We swam a lot at sweeties house.. Ezra is a really great swimmer, Rylie is timid but by the end of the week she was taking off her floaties and doing great.   We have gone swimming several times this summer and she is still doing really good... I'm proud of her since she was so afraid at the beginning of the summer. 

 Rylie helping Sweetie water the garden.

 

Rylie being Rylie! :)

 

 

I am going to be posting more random pictures as I find them...but also hope to just start catching up on everything too.   I think my next post will be about being pregnant :)