It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Okay, so it's actually looked a lot like Christmas for a while now. We were really good at getting the decorations up early; we were just late documenting it on the blog! I love Christmas time for the decorations. It just makes the home feel so cozy and bright. My mom always decorated a ton for Christmas every year. I always thought it was so beautiful as a kid. I loved the lighted garlands, the awesome nativity scene, and of course the tree. I remember we would even "organize" the presents to make it look like there were way more than there actually was. haha Every time a new present was put under the tree, we would have to re-organize them to make them perfect!

This is our fire place! I am so excited to finally have a fireplace and a mantle to decorate for Christmas! I LOVE our stockings. My grandma Betty Lundholm (my mom's mom) has crocheted or knitted (I actually don't really know the difference) stockings for all of her family. Each one is individual and different and the great-grandchildren's stockings even have their initial on theirs. I have received so many compliments on them and I am so proud to say that my Gramma made them. She is so talented! She also always makes blankets for the new great-grand babies. We use both of ours on a daily basis and love them! Thank you Gramma. We love you!

This is our Christmas card this year! It is the first one that we've made. We only send out a few to immediate family, so don't be offended if you didn't get one. No one did. :)

This is on our counter-top dividing the kitchen from the dining room. This is the ginger bread house that Luke calls "casha" (casa). You can see a few of the candies already missing from his snacking. He reminds me of Hansel and Gretel every time he wants a piece of "casha" because he could just keep eating and eating in pure oblivion.

Here is our Christmas tree! I absolutely love it! Another tradition my Gramma started was to buy an ornament for each of her grand children every year. Now that I have a tree of my own, I have 18 very special ornaments given to me by my grandparents. Each is labeled with my name and the year it was given.  Now my mom has started that same tradition with her grandchildren. It is so nice to have a unique and fun Christmas tree rather than just a tree with any old plain ornaments.

I saw something on facebook today that made me laugh. A friend wrote on her status: "Merry Christmas Adam! (the day before Christmas Eve)" haha

So, Merry Christmas Adam!

Our children.

SAM

Francisco: Yesterday as I was folding some of Sam's clothes I was filled with some sadness that he won't wear  some of those clothes anymore. He is finally moving from new born into 0-3month size (about time right?). I guess I felt sad because I'm not getting to spend as much time with him as I did with Luke and he is growing. My baby is growing. At night when I was getting ready to go to bed I felt happy that my clothes had Sam's baby smell on them. I love my two boys.

Emily: The boys had doctors appointments the other day. Sam was 10 lbs 3 oz. He has almost doubled in size! He was also 22 3/4 in. His weight, length, and head size were all riding around the 25th%ile. So he is very proportionate. He is perfectly healthy. He got 4 shots and had a rough time. He was fine at the beginning, but when we woke up from a nap a few hours later, he wouldn't stop screaming! It was so sad! You could tell it just hurt really bad. It also didn't help that Luke was jealous and tried to whack him with a toy golf club. Thankfully Luke has bad aim and only nicked his ear. We gave Sam some Tylenol and put heat packs on his legs which helped him a lot. He slept most of the day. The only problem was that all that sleeping made him wake up several times during the night!

Some milestones for Sam lately: He has started smiling like crazy! He is SO cute. and I'm pretty sure we heard his first giggle this morning. We will keep you posted if he continues that cuteness. He holds his head up pretty well, but he doesn't get a lot of tummy time because we are terrified of Luke stepping on him! So it might take him a little longer to start rolling over. He generally only wakes up once each night sometime between 3 and 5 depending on when we went to bed. When he is hungry, he is so funny he starts pumping his leg very rhythmically; just in and out. He will sort of fuss to let me know and then patiently waits for me to feed him, just pumping that leg. I have to get it on video! Overall, he is a very happy baby. We love him to pieces!

LUKE

Francisco: Luke is also growing so fast. He is learning the alphabet, numbers and colors. He knows green (verde), red (rojo), and blue (azul). He can associate the letter 'c' with casa (house),  'g' with globo (balloon), 'm' with mami, 'p' with pan (bread), 'u' with uva (grape). I'm pretty sure that at this point he is bilingual. His vocabulary is expanding in both in Spanish and English. I think though he knows more words in English since they are easier to say than in Spanish (eg. one syllable compare to 3 in Spanish). He watches TV in English and I only speak to him in Spanish. Emily also does a great job speaking to him in Spanish. I can honestly say that She's bilingual as well.

I have been trying to teach him that now he is two years old instead of one. So whenever I ask him how old he is (Cuántos años tienes?) now he says 'DOSH'. Which is actually dos (two). So yesterday I was with Sam and I asked Sam how old he was, and Luke came and whispered in Sam's ear DOSH. It was so adorable. I guess he is learning something!

Luke is also 'almost' potty trained. He's been 'almost' potty trained for a while, but he is getting better. He doesn't go number 2 on his own, it has to be on his diaper which is really annoying. We have to find a way to get it to go number 2 on the potty!  Number one is easy, even in public places like restaurants, church, etc. Now and then when he is too distracted playing he'll have an accident, but it doesn't happen very often.

Emily: Luke also went to the doctors. He weighed 25 lbs which is the 25%ile as well! I cannot remember his height, but it was in the 60%ile! I thought he was short but apparently he is tall! He hated the entire doctor appointment even though the only thing they really did was prick his finger to check iron status and for lead poisoning at the very end. He was happy to get a sucker, but then he dropped it as we were walking out the door, so we had to go back and get another. On our way home he passed out due to exhaustion with the sucker still in his mouth.

Luke is a very good boy. I am proud to report that he eats most of his veggies! His favorite is broccoli. He also still goes crazy for fruit. He will eat his fruit even before a cookie or a treat on his plate! We have a bit of a problem though. He was learned how to open the fridge. So, he will go and get the bag of grapes and sit down and have a feast! The other day he tried to eat a cube of butter! Yuck! We also bought go-gurt for the first time last week. (the yogurt in a tube). Anyway I gave him one and then left him at the table to eat it. After about 10 minutes I went to check on him knowing that a go-gurt does not take that long to eat! I found him still in his booster at the table with his elbow on the table and hand holding the tube up-side-down and resting on his forehead. He couldn't figure out how to get the yogurt out except to let it slowly drain up-side-down. It was so sweet, because I could tell he was so bored but he wanted to eat his yogurt!

Luke also loves to read! He can identify his books through the characters. For example, I can ask him to bring me the books with Corduroy and he will bring them! He loves characters. His favorites are: Elmo, Diego, Blue, Dora, Ming-Ming from TV and Corduroy, Biscuit, and Busytown from books. He also loves Mickey Mouse. He calls him "too-loo" because Mickey always says, "Oh Toodles!" The other night I put Luke to bed and I checked on him about an hour later to go and get his milk. I found him still awake with all his books all over his bed! What a good boy to stay in bed and read!

Luke loves to color. He can now draw faces and calls it "Papi". He loves for me to draw things. He always asks me to draw our family "papi, mami, baby, Guke" and trains "choo-choo". Maybe I am stupid but I trust him with pretty much any writing utensil by himself. He has free reign on colored pencils, some chalk and some crayons. I think he even has a pen in his room right now. But he has never really colored anything that he is not supposed to...

One last story: we made a ginger bread house a few weeks ago and Luke was so excited to realize it was made out of candy! Now, on a daily basis, he will ask to eat the "casha". It is slowly losing its decoration. haha.

We love our boys. They are so cute and sweet and even have fun together. Luke loves to go "night-night" with Sam in our bed. He loves to talk to him and make him smile. He says "Hi Nano!" "Mamo" (Te amo) and will squeal "Ai!" right in his face just like Papi. I feel so blessed to have such a wonderful family. They are the best!

I'm 1/8th of a dentist! : )

I finished one semester of dental school. And oh boy IT WAS HARD!

I took 39 exams, 11 quizzes, 6 gross anatomy presentations, 2 evidence based dentistry cases and lots of teeth that I waxed up! 

I'm writing this post to remember these long days of studying. Waking up at 5 am and studying till 10 pm pretty much everyday of the week including Saturday(Except for Sundays, of course). I ended up with pretty good grades and there might be a change that I end up specializing.... we'll see.

I'm grateful for the support of my sweet wife and my children. 

Dental school is NOT easy, in fact it is the HARDEST thing I've ever done. 

Christmas Pictures : )

Christmas is almost here and we are getting ready to spend it all by ourselves! Dental school has come with a LOT of sacrifices but I know that eventually it will pay off. Being far from family is hard, especially during the holidays but we will survive.  We feel very blessed to already have some good friends here in Texas. We are loving our new church ward and we totally feel part of it. 

Little Sam (almost 2 months) given us a bit of a smile.

Luke loves little Sam!

Luke is adjusting to Sam's arrival. Luke loves him but now and then he smacks him out of no-where!

Just couldn't resist that pin striped suit. Abuelita got it for him.

First smile caught on "film"

Luke wanted some pictures too. 

Generous Gifts

I just want to take a minute to thank every one who has given us things for our boys. We are so thankful for your generosity. We have gotten many gifts for Luke and Sam, even from some people we don't even know! I just want to say thank you. We are so blessed and feel so loved.

These first pictures are things that Amanda, our sister in law made for us. She is so crafty and handy at the sewing machine. Thank you Amanda for sharing your talents with us and taking the time to make these items for me and Sam. We use both the nursing cover and the car seat cover on a daily basis! They are great! Amanda also generously gave us many of the baby items that they no longer needed including a swing (which Sam is sleeping in right now), a bouncer, and an exer-saucer. Those have also been so nice to have! Thank you Amanda! 

 

These next pictures are of the adorable little booties are from my mom's co-worker Sonia. Sam wears them all the time and we get tons of compliments on them! She also made him a pair of camo converse booties. So cute!

These last pictures are of Luke enjoying his birthday present from his Abuelita. Although she doesn't even know what she bought for him (she only gave us some money), we are grateful for her generosity! We bought him a cool little table with green stools from Ikea. We couldn't wait to give it to him, so his birthday present was a little early, but that's okay.

 He actually liked playing with his new silverware the most... That wasn't even a present!

We also bought him some new curtains that match his bed spread. His other curtains were just too small for his window.

I tribute to my wife ; )

I have an amazing wife.  After a week at home and seeing all the hard work that is to have a toddler and a new born at home I have to give all credit to Emily. She is just amazing beyond measure. She never complains about anything. She makes it seem that all comes natural and that it is easy, which I know is not true. There are those long nights that interrupt her sleep, many diapers to change, a hungry baby to feed, a toddler that is entering the terrible 2s, and a husband to take care of. I believe she is a professional mom and wife! I don't know how she does it all. She doesn't complain about being tired or even grumpy! She's always in a good mood and as far as I know the baby sleeps like an angel at night! : ) She doesn't get complicated with the babies and I feel that we can always be on the go. It might take 30 extra min to get ready to go out, but it is not a problem. And have I mentioned that she ALWAYS looks good. She is a natural queen that doesn't need the sparkle of fancy things to feel appreciated or special (Don't worry honey, once I have money you'll get those things ; )  but I know you don't really care )

I'm pretty sure there are even more things that she does that I have yet to discover and learn to appreciate. Sweetie I love you and I just wanted to say THANK YOU. I consider myself a very very lucky guy. TE AMO.

Forgive me if you think in this post I'm bragging, but I can't help it and all of it is true.

I know.. I know another post about our babies!

I love taking pictures of my family.

Sam's Baby Blessing

 Sam was blessed this last Sunday November 13, 2011. It was such a beautiful blessing and such a beautiful day. Ines (Abuelita) was so excited that she got to be at the blessing.

 The happy new family!

 Luke loves his Abuelita! So cute that he gives her kisses. 

 Luke in his new suit! Sam has a matching black pin stripe suit that will hopefully fit by Christmas!

 The booties were made by Rhonda Prewitt (My mom's previous co-worker and friend)

 Luke exploring and running away from us as we took pictures. He's so cute!

 Francisco is such a good Papi! They have so much fun together!

 Photo Shoot!

 Check out his gorgeous blue eyes!

 His blessing outfit was much too big, even though it was a size x-small 0-2 mos. In this picture, I tucked in the sides so that you could actually tell he was inside of it! See the sleeves rolled up?

 Sam was blessed:
- to listen to the spirit
- to know that Christ is his Savior
- to love the scriptures
- to have a cheerful attitude
- to be a blessing to others around you
- to be a blessing to your friends and family
- to be worthy for  an eternal companion
- with health
-with intellect
- with a desire to keep the commandments

Samuel Benson Darquea

Samuel Benson Darquea arrived on October 21, 2011 at 8:13am.

He was 5 lbs 6 oz and 19 inches long.

He has the longest little feet and the biggest hands ever! He is going to be a tall and skinny boy I think! (Just like his Mami!)

3 days old here

So, Sam was diagnosed with intrauterine growth restriction at about 36 weeks gestation. We did an ultrasound and some non stress tests. Everything appeared healthy and normal except his abdomen was measuring about 2 weeks behind schedule. His head and femur were normal size. The specialist said that because his growth was asymmetrical, it might be wise to induce me between 38 and 39 weeks. So, I went to my regular OB doctor and he said we will induce me the following week at 39 weeks. Of course, I was anxious and worried that my baby was growing properly and I didn't feel like my belly had really grown that much between 36 and 38 weeks and I felt that his movements were not very strong. So, I mentioned this to my doctor and asked him what the purpose was for waiting a week longer if the baby isn't growing properly. He said basically that the only reason we are waiting is to make sure his lungs are fully developed (even though they usually are fully mature by 37 weeks). Then he asked me if the movements have changed from last week to this week. Of course, I wasn't really sure, but after I thought about it, I decided that I thought they were different and weaker now than before.

Because I said that one sentence, the doctor decided that if his movements were weaker than they used to be and because he is measuring small, I should be induced right away.

I went to the hospital about 4 hours later at about 5pm on the 20th of October. Yikes! They gave me Cervidil to soften my cervix and would start Pitocin in the morning.

This labor was quite a bit different than with Luke. I had to sleep on the labor and delivery bed, which was terribly uncomfortable, so I slept horrible! At about 5:30am, they took out the cervidil which dilated me from a 2 to a 3. They let me shower and get ready and would start pitocin after that. Well, I stood up, went to the bathroom and Sam wriggled around and I knew he would be coming out soon! My contractions started up about 3-4 minutes apart as I showered, dried my hair and put on makeup! When I was done at about 6:30am, they checked me again and I was a 6! I asked for an epidural (I didn't want to miss out again!) So the epidural was in by about 7:15am, but it wasn't very strong at all. My contractions still hurt like crazy but I knew that Sam was about to come out ,so I didn't want a ton of medicine only to be numb for 3 hours after sam was out! Anyway, Sam was out after only 3 hard pushes.

It was a fast labor, but it seemed harder and more painful than with Luke. I think it was because of the lack of sleep, having to labor in the hard hospital bed, and being more aware of what was happening. With Luke I was just in so much shock that I didn't remember all the pain and everything.

So that is our story! Sam and I are perfectly healthy and happy. Recovery has been a LOT easier this time around and nursing is going great!

Luke is adjusting pretty well. He is showing signs of jealousy, but he also loves his brother to pieces.