a lot to be thankful for

we were invited to our friends', the wilkersons, home this year for thanksgiving and we had a great time meeting their family and enjoying a deeeelicious thanksgiving dinner together. the kids (all 8 of them!) had a blast. check them out at their own little table! we have a lot to be thankful for, but this year i am especially thankful to God for our health.

dedication of our girls

we dedicated lucas to the Lord back when he was just under a year old, and it was time for us to do the same with emma and elise. the neat thing each time we've done it is the amount of friends who are also making the same commitment with us. the first pictures are from lucas' dedication back in 2005. it's amazing how much things can change in a couple of years! praise God for all of our little blessings.

november 5, 2005

three years later november 23, 2008

no time for stories!

okay, so the title says it all. i have had no time to update this blog of mine because things in our household have been crazy. i didn't think that things would be so hectic with 3 kids, but they have been. on top of having a newborn in our household, allan re-injured his knee playing volleyball so we've had one man down for the last month or so. he recently had reconstructive surgery done and is still recovering from it. it went successfully, but he's still in a lot of pain. the first 3 or 4 days after surgery were incredibly hard because i had to care for the kids 24/7 and care for allan all at the same time, all by myself. thank goodness some good friends brought us some meals because they saved my sanity on those nights. thank you, thank you! i have to share a quote from one of those friends who brought us a tasty baked spaghetti meal. his words of advice to allan were, "keep the crutches, good things will happen." i had to laugh when i read that. it's true though. we've received a lot of sympathetic "oh let me help you!" gestures from all kinds of people when they see me and my hands full with lucas, emma, and elise and allan hobbling around in crutches. can you imagine us?

the kids are all doing great! lucas is sweet, sweet, sweet. he is incredibly helpful and thoughtful, and he is enjoying pre-school. he still doesn't share a whole lot about his days in school, but i get told from his teachers that he's doing great. he is still super inquisitive and will ask you a question until you give him an answer. and, not any answer will satisfy him. it has to be the "right" answer. he knows the difference. he loves music and singing. anytime i hum a new tune or sing a song he hasn't heard before, he'll ask me what song it is and to teach it to him. he picks up tunes really quickly. he's also started memorizing scripture. it has been so neat to see him learn God's word. so far, he has psalm 23, john 3:16, and philippians 4:13 down. the next verse i'm going to teach him is ephesians 6:1-3!

emma is a kick in the pants. she's got the cutest personality. my favorite is when you ask her for a kiss. she'll come right up to you and give her cheek to you. it's the cutest thing. we're like, "hey, we asked YOU for a kiss!" she loves to copy whatever lucas is doing whether it be putting a puzzle together, drawing, hiding from allan when he gets home, or waving a sword around pretending it's a light saber. it is so heart-warming to see the two of them together. emma is also starting to talk a lot. no one but allan, lucas, and i can understand what she's saying, but we can definitely tell that she's learning her words. she is waaaay more adventurous than lucas ever was, which can cause her to get into more trouble sometimes. but, i still love her to pieces!

and, of course, we have our little elise who is just easy, easy going. she has slept through the night on a few occasions. (for you parents of newborns out there, you know that this is the most important skill to brag about!) but, generally, she is still waking up once at night to nurse. the last few nights have been an anomaly because she has been the fussiest she's ever been, which was horrible for us since these were the nights just after allan's surgery. i think it was my fault, though, because for three days in a row i drank a hazelnut iced coffee from mcdonald's (yum!). i think the caffeine was the culprit. so, i've backed off of the iced coffees and things seem to be getting back to the norm. elise is really alert when she's awake and loves to stare into our eyes and smile and coo at us. (i'll post her stats another time since i can't remember what they were.) we think she looks most like my sister so, between me and allan, elise has got to look more like me because allan and vicky look nothing alike. i always say that her hair makes her look like a cockatiel...a cute one, though! i get sad thinking that she is our last baby and that she is going to grow up way too quickly for us. so, we're just enjoying the moments as they come.

here are some pictures to catch you up on how much the kids have grown...enjoy!

a monkey, a lion, a ladybug...oh my!

(sorry, i couldn't resist the cheesy title!)

we were in our first parade this year! we even had a fire engine escort us just like in a real parade. our halloween night started out with a parade around our friend's neighborhood. it was a lot of fun, but hard work for some of us. (can you spot the incredible hulk pushing the guy in the wheelchair?) it then led to some ringing of doorbells for candy. once emma got down a handful of houses, she was ready to break into a pack of plain m&ms. she was done for the night once that happened. the boys did a good job going all the way from our neighborhood through to brady and shannon's neighborhood. we ended the night enjoying some very yummy desserts and watching our friend erik scare the bejeebers out of his wife with a fake spider. i wish i had caught that on tape because it was hilarious!

seven years

allan took me to tagaris tonight to celebrate our 7-year anniversary! it was a complete surprise to me because i wasn't expecting to have an evening together without any of the kids! but, our good friends offered to watch ALL three of them. allan and i had a great time just talking and planning our near future together. i have the best husband and am grateful for all that he does for me. our night ended with a poem that allan wrote for me, which made me all teary-eyed. i love you, sweetheart!

family time

i was so excited that my sister was able to come out for a visit at the end of september. the kids loved seeing her and, since my parents were also here, we got to spend time as a whole family...a rare thing!

school days

our little boy is not so little anymore! after much consideration, we decided to enroll lucas in preschool this year. (if you are wondering what all there was for us to "consider," we couldn't decide whether i should homeschool him or send him to preschool. in the end, we decided not to homeschool this year because i would have my hands pretty full with the addition of elise. wise decision!) lucas told us that he had a great time at school. he didn't have much trouble leaving us. he was a little hesitant at first, hiding by allan a little, but with just a little encouragement he walked into his classroom and said goodbye to us. he loves being in class with his friends, annie and chase. he looks so cute...and so grown up!

our elise

elise is almost one month old and she is getting cuter by the day! we are all doing well, mainly because my parents are here to help out with so much. elise is not sleeping through the night yet (still waking every couple of hours to eat), but she goes right back to sleep after her feedings so that is great. lucas and emma continue to love and adore their baby sister. at 2 weeks, elise weighed 7.6 pounds...3 ounces above her birth weight. way to go, elise! but, at almost 4 weeks now, she still hasn't lost her umbilical cord stump. elise is very alert when she's awake and she loves to look around. about 4 days or so ago, i noticed that she looks back at you when you look at her. i could just hold her in my arms and stare at her face all day long. i already feel like she's growing up way too fast and pretty soon she won't be a baby anymore (sniff sniff). look at how she's growing...

1+1=5

elise lee tuan september 2, 2008 | 8:06 am7 lbs, 3 oz  | 19 inches
our little elise arrived 11 days early, on tuesday, september 2.  allan and i were so thrilled to finally meet her!  lucas and emma met their baby sister the day after she was born.  as soon as i saw lucas, emma, and elise together, i knew that our family was now complete.  the three of them will be the best of friends, with a few fights here and there, of course!

it all began with me feeling mild contractions around 8 pm monday night (sept 1) as i was dozing on the couch. i decided to head off to bed at 10 pm and was woken up by strong stomach pains around 2:45 am. i couldn't tell if they were just regular stomach pains or if they were labor pains, so i decided to wait awhile to see if they would get worse.  they DID. in merely 20 minutes or so, my contractions were 6 minutes apart and became extremely painful. i still wasn't convinced that i was in "real" labor, but i decided to play it safe.  allan and i headed over to the hospital around 3:45 in the morning.  i found out i was 5-6 cm dilated at 4:30 am, and by 5 am i was 7 cm dilated. my contractions were working! my water broke at 5:03 (exactly), and i got my epidural shortly after (whew!).  i labored comfortably after that while chatting away with my labor nurse, becky, who was a doula for 18 years. she was great! she gave me great tips and helped me through my contractions. at 7:45 am i was fully dilated and ready to go. tanya, my new labor nurse, was incredible. she and allan (and my doctor) helped me through 10 minutes of pushing, and at 8:06 am a perfect little girl came into the world...our little elise.  we thank and praise God for such a special gift from above.
:: at the hospital ::
:: our cuties ::
:: home at last ::

1+1=5

status (quo)

nothing real exciting going on with the pregnancy, but i thought i'd update anyway. on monday, i was dilated to 2 cm (yay! but i was hoping i'd be like a 4 already). i got an F on my group b, so i will need to have antibiotics during delivery. i'm not too happy about that, especially since i expected to pass the test. i tested negative for it with both lucas and emma. oh well. i hit my 25 lb mark this week, which was not surprising to me. i've been craving baaaaaad things lately. my friend made us these incredibly delicious chocolate chip cookies that i had no self-control over. i ate at least half of the bag she gave us. at least.

i am really, really ready to meet this baby girl! we still don't have a name yet, so the pressure will be on when she arrives. suggestions? leave us a comment. :)

my next appointment is next thursday (sept 4)...i question if i'll last until then!

catching up

we took lucas and emma to the pacific science center in seattle back in the end of july. lucas had a GREAT time looking at the dinosaur exhibit. he's really into dinosaurs right now. it's interesting how kids go through similar stages in terms of interest. i remember a friend of mine telling me her daughter all of a sudden started showing a huge interest in dinosaurs. i wonder how it all starts? with lucas, it was from some books that i pulled out of our garage. i had them stored there because he was too young for them when i got them. i came across them one day as i was cleaning. once i brought them inside the house, lucas wouldn't put them down. anyway, emma had a good time in seattle as well. she especially loved going to all the parks near the u district. you can see some pictures of our trip here.

on another front, i went to see my doctor last week and he ordered another ultrasound for me. he said that i was measuring big, so he wanted to see how much the baby weighed. we found out that she is approximately 6 lbs, 9 oz. BUT, my ultrasound tech did say that the measurements could be off by 1 pound either way. i'm hoping that our babiest girl is not already 6.9. babies are supposed to gain 0.5 pound each week at this point. that would mean she could potentially be an 8+ pounder! (emma was only 6.11 when she was born, and lucas was 7 2.3.) i'm still huge. everyone concurs. i was walking through the mall when the lady behind the orange julius counter said, "wow, are you due in, like, a minute?" fortunately, i don't get offended by what people say. it makes me laugh, actually. i remember when i was pregnant with emma, a kid behind the blockbuster counter said to me, "dude, you're huge!" anyone who doesn't know me who tries to guess what i'm having guesses that it's a boy. interesting.

lucas just finished taking some swimming lessons with two of his buds. he had a rough first day, but did a great job the rest of the session. he still doesn't know how to swim yet, but is definitely more comfortable in the water. here are some pictures my friend captured from one of the lessons. the last one is of emma and brayden playing ring around the rosie. aren't they cute?