Canada Week 2

We stayed busy the last week in June. We had my grandpa Peters (my mom's dad) over for a steak barbecue on the 22nd.

MMMM! Beef, it's what's for dinner! He got to meet his 4th great grandchild.These are my sisters: Janesa on the left and Gina on the right.

Four generations on my mom's side.

Sunday, the 24th, we had kind of a late Father's day wiener roast with my mom's side of the family. She has two sisters and their kids and grandkids came down to my parents.This is my cousin's daughter, Sephira. She and Katelyn are 3 months apart and play really well with each other. This was their second meeting and they remembered each other. It helps when both parties are helping the kids remember by showing them pictures. This is my other cousin's son, Brody. Brody and Sephira are 1st cousins. My girls and these two are 2nd cousins. Walking back down the drivewayafter checking out the cows.

My Grandpa surrounded by all of his girls and one Great grandson. I only have 3 cousins on this side and all of them being girls. Girls run pretty thick in this family. My grandma has 3 girls, my mom and auntie Marilyn each had 3 girls. Now Candace (sitting) had Sephira, I had Katelyn. Stephanie snuck Brody in there and then I had Megan. These are the cousins that my girls will know, because there doesn't seem to be any cousins coming on either side of mine or Jason's family anytime soon.

Monday, my friends Lisa and Sarah met us at the Plum Coulee Beach. It's a man made little beach in town and yes, Plum Coulee is the name. I went to elementary school here. Which was kind of ironic we were there, because when we were packing up to leave. the whole elementary school came out to the little lake to watch the 8th graders row their cardboard box boats across it. It was quite comical to watch and nostalgic because we saw 3 teachers we all had when we were in elementary school.

The kids had fun and got some sun. Gina was nice enough to come with us and help me with Megan or taking Katelyn in the water too. I did venture into the chilly water as well, so I wasn't a total beach bum.

Me, Sarah, and Lisa. Our kids, Orrin(2), Katelyn(3), Claire (3 1/2) and Gracie (4). The girls are all little mini me's of their mothers.

My parents have an expansive lawn to mow and they mowed it a few times while we were there. My dad cleaned up what was mowed by raking it to the cows and his little shadow was right beside him helping.

And after some hard work in the sun, a bath and a Dairy Queen Dilly bar were in order. I was shocked to seeshe ate the WHOLE thing!

We spent the afternoon with some new friends in Thornhill. I had not seen my friend Renee Kreiser in a few years, so it was high time we caught up. Her girls and Katelyn got along quite well once everyone warmed up to each other.

The 28th was my 31st birthday and the first time in a long time that I got to celebrate with friends. I met a lot of my girlfriends from elementary and high school for supper. Some of these friends I've known since kindergarten and others since high school. They have gotten together once a month since we graduated. That's 13 yrs ago! Sadly, I didn't take any pictures of us, but someone did. After dinner, we went to Sarah's house for dessert and talked till 11:30pm! And it's a mommy only night, but I did have to take Megan. It was great to see a lot of them again.

The 29th, we went out for breakfast with my family before Gina flew back to Edmonton. I met Sarah, Nettie, Theresa and Charmaine at the Splash park in Morden after breakfast. It took Katelyn a while to get used to the sprinklers but she did eventually get a little bit wet. I love these parks because they are safer than the pool and easier for me with an infant and a preschooler. Sarah was champ and took Gracie and Katelyn through the rainbow since they didn't really want to go in by themselves.

Out of 5 mamas, we had 11 kids there! When we weren't getting wet, we were swinging and climbing on the playground.

Canada Trip Week 1

Well, a lot has happened in the last month. Right now, we are staying with my parents in good old Manitoba for 2-3 weeks, just me and the girls. Since Jason is at the academy and my cousin was getting married on the 23rd of June, my parents were very willing to pick the 3 of us up and drive us back to Canada. We did it in one day even with two small kids. We left on Father's day, the 17th. Katelyn was so easy as long as the movies kept rolling and we made some pit stops for potty breaks. Thankfully, no accidents occurred. Megan also did well. We did have to make more stops to feed her, but it was all good. We did stop in Dickenson, ND for lunch at McDonalds which allowed us all to get out and stretch our legs. We drove to Rugby, about 3 hrs from home, and decided just to keep on driving even if it was 7 pm. We got through the border without a hitch and drove through some rain. How the green and rain has just been so refreshing to my soul. It's been too long since I've been here in the summer. We did get home around10:30-45pm. So it did take us 15hrs, but that's not too bad.

Monday and Tuesday we rested up at home. By Wednesday I knew I needed to start seeing friends, because the weeks were going to go by way too fast. Wednesday I called my friend Lisa up and had a playdate with her 2 kids. Claire is 3 1/2 and Orrin 1 1/2. When I drove up in my parent car, I must have pressed the lock button and accidentally locked the girls in thecar! Thankfully it was a cooler day and didn't get too hot in the car. I borrowed Lisa's car and drove as fast as I dared to my parents to get the spare set. Thankfully, Megan stopped crying once I left and Katelyn was fine sitting there and it was only a few minutes to my parents. We've now showed her how to unlock the door should that happen again.

The girls had a great time playing together once they warmed up to each other. They headed out with milk in hand to feed the 2 kittens in the barn. Of course, being 3, they did get preoccupied on the trip there and back. The cats made a trip to the house and back to the barn, the milk was forgotten and a large puddle was found and they both came in sopping wet with flooded boots.

Thursday brought on some rain showers again.

Rain showers result in puddles and puddles draw kids.

We stopped in at my cousins, Brad & Val and their kids, Allison& Jordan. It is so weird for me to see these kids growing up, because in my mind, they will forever be 5 & 3 like they were in our wedding almost 9 years ago instead of the 14 and 12 they are now! Alli was just in love with baby Megan and Katelyn kept her hopping when they went out to play.

Friday, we went out to my friend Sarah's to play with her daughter, Gracie who is 4. Gracie has a cute little pony named Chocolate Chip.

Sarah was gracious enough to saddle up Chocolate Chip for a short ride up the driveway for the girls. Katelyn was a little apprehensive at first, but she held onto the horn and a hand and she was good to go. It has been a year since she was on my horse, so this was something she wasn't used to but she did great. The girls jumped on their trampoline, played in the sand box which resulted in Katelyn stepping on a nail in her heel. After 20 min on the phone to the hospital in Powell, checking if she had had a tetanus shot, they said she had and it was good for another 8 years. Whoo! What a relief. This trip was kind of becoming eventful everywhere we went.

Saturday was my cousin Corey's wedding to his bring Kendra. Sadly we didn't take any pictures but we did go for a Derksen Cousin photo. Everyone was there minus 1 family that left and one cousin who couldn't make it.

Megan Grace Pellegrino

40 weeks on May 11th

To This On May 12th

She's Here! God timed it just right!

My due date was May 11th, 2012. I had a doctor's appointment on the 9th and the doctor and I had discussed what would happen if I went over my due date. I was alright with waiting another week and see where we would go from there, if not we could induce the following Thursday night. Thursday night was chosen because Dr. Spomer would be gone to a family graduation that weekend and we would do it before she had to leave, if the need arose.

Friday, the 11th came and went with not much action until sometime in the night. Thankfully, Jason made it home that night. I thought I started to feel some slight contractions, but nothing really major and they were spread out quite far. Saturday, the 12th, I was definitely feeling some cramping pains but again nothing close together but was having them during the morning. We did a bunch of yard work during the day, in hopes it might help and things just needed to get done too. Around 5pm, they started to get closer together. 5:30pm they were closer together and growing in strength. I didn't know what to make for supper, so McDonald's was suggested by me and we ate in the car while Jason was at the station getting a few things to go out to the shooting range. I started timing the contractions and they were 3 mins apart consistantly. Jason was caught talking to some co-workers inside and finally came out after 7. We were debating if we should go out to the shooting range with him or go home and see where these contractions would take us. We ended up going home, thankfully.

I had packed my hospital bag that afternoon, since I had left it to the last minute. So we were ready to go. I didn't want to get checked into the hospital too early and get charged for an extra day, so we wanted to stay home as long as we could. We got home and Jason called our friend Theresa, who was willing to stay with Katelyn at home. Surprisingly, she was in Cody at a wedding instead of her home which is an hour away. So she came over in a shorter amount of time than we expected, and was here about 8-8:30pm. The pains were definitely getting harder to bear but I hung in there. At 9:30pm I thought we should go. We knew of another couple who just had a baby in February, who went in to the hospital and she was already at a 10cm. I didn't want to wait too long and be in that position.

I got checked in at 9:30pm and was in a gown and in the big "party" room by 9:45pm. The room had a couch and lots of space to move around. It was nice! By 9:50 I had had 4 contractions in 5 mins and they didn't feel pleasant. The nurse checked me and said, your about a 2-3, so we'll have you walk for an hour and see what happens. Within the next couple of minutes, she checked again and I was at a 4 and progressing very quickly. They really hurt now. The nurse told me the anesthesiologist would take 45 mins to get here if we needed him. I told her to call him NOW!

The next hour was almost chaotic. The on call doctor, who thankfully was another woman, (I prefer women over male doctors especially for having babies) came in and kept checking me and the baby. The baby's heart rate would drop with every contraction because I was "freaking out" basically. I would kind of stop breathing normally and be so focused on the pain and not take in enough oxygen. So I was put on oxygen and had my head tipped down on the bed to bring more oxygen to the baby. So I really couldn't see much of what was going on in the room. Dr. Durney, the on call dr. said to alert the OR just in case we needed to c-section. That wasn't something I wanted to hear. Thankfully, Jason was right next to me, helping me to "combat breathe". It's basically breathing really slow in and out to slow down your heart rate. Something he learned at the police academy. It wasn't really helping. Everytime I breathed in, my body wanted to push.

In the flurry of action, I had those nurses and dr. hopping, Dr. Spomer came in around 10:30ish. She came over my face and checked on me, told me I was doing a good job. She had just enough time to put on her scrubs, get up dated and tell me to push. Not long before, Dr. Durney said that I was at about a 9 and I shouldn't push, but my body was not listening and I had short spurts of wanting to push. Finally, I felt her moving down and yelled that she was coming. The action increased and Spomer got into position. I know I didn't push that long, at least it didn't feel like it since I couldn't see the clock. Spomer threatened to use the vacuum to get her out and I yelled, "just use the vacuum". I do have to say I was very vocal at this birth. :)

Within a couple of minutes and pushes, out she came at 10:45pm. I am proud to say that I did it drug free, but really, I didn't have a choice because the dr. didn't even get there. So, as I told Jason, I am a real woman now because I gave birth without drugs. This time, they were able to put her on my stomach and Jason did cut the cord. With Katelyn, we weren't able to because they wisked her away because of meconium. Megan also had meconium, but they didn't seem too worried about it. She was pretty blue when she came out and she gave us a faint cry. All I could say was, "oh God, Oh God, I can't believe I did it!" It happened all so quickly and thankfully, it happened when it did, because Jason could have missed the whole thing had he been down at the academy. We did have him set up with a ministry called Pilots for Christ, who were willing to fly to Douglas, WY to pick him up and deliver him home. It would have taken about 2 hrs to call them and have him home, but this was so much better. God was good to me, because he knew I needed him there.

So she was born Saturday and to try and save some money on the final bill, insisted to leave Sunday night. They like us to be there for 24 hrs, so that night at 10:30pm I got wheeled out to my car and drove 4 houses down from the hospital, to bring the newest addition home. Jason had to leave Sunday afternoon to go back to Douglas, so I soloed it going home, but had a friend stay over who stayed with Katelyn over the weekend. She left shortly before my parents pulled up on Monday.

Family of 4

One very excited big Sister! She smothers her sister in kisses.

Trial Baby

(She had to try on the baby bonnet. She looks like a little Hudderite to me!)

With the arrival of baby #2 any day, technically 6 more until the official due date, a trip to the storage shed to get out all of our baby gear was due. With Jason gone during the week, I had to take it upon myself to look through our totes of miscellaneous things and find clothes, carrier, bath tub etc. Most of it was pretty easy to find, but I forgot how many clothes I had for Katelyn. To say God doesn't provide is an understatement.

While the carrier was on the floor, Katelyn had to try it out with her own wee one.

I don't know how many times I buckled and unbuckled baby in the car seat, but it kept her entertained for as long as possible, while I sorted through the bags of clothes. It's so hard to know what to keep out since it could say 3 months and really fit them much earlier. I just kept out all the sleepers and undershirts for now. With having a small house and one closet and chest of drawers to share for two, I can't keep everything out like I did for Katelyn. Oh well, we'll make do.

My little circle painter. That's what we like to paint, circles.

Pellegrino Barber Shop

One evening, we watched our neighbor girl and Katelyn's friend, Samantha, while her mom played volleyball and dad was still at work. We had just had a rousing 45 minutes of play dough when they both went into Katelyn's room and this is what I hear, "K, my turn." "My turn." This was too precious not to catch on "film". They came up with hairdresser all on their own, complete with apron covering. I have never seen them play this but both have had their hair cuts before. I don't know if it is a coincidence, but Sam's dad owns a barber shop and cuts her hair. They were playing so well, pretending to cut one another's hair with a cookie cutter and then the play dough scissors. No troubles were had taking turns, it was amazing. Not bad for a 2 yr old and almost 3 yr old. Unfortunately it didn't last all night and some noses did have to see the inside of a corner, but we did survive.

She's Out

This has never happened before. Never has Katelyn just fallen asleep outside of her car seat or room. The room almost never happens by herself, but as of today it has happened too. She was a pooped little girl with no afternoon nap. And no afternoon nap means a short early evening nap. Oh well, at least we both get a short break.