Christmas

 A few days before Christmas Sea World advertised "buy one, get one" season passes. We were on the fence about whether to get season passes this year or not. The sale sealed the deal for us but there was one catch. It had to be activated at the part before the first week of January. We looked up the weather and Christmas Eve was forecasted to be 77 degrees so we decided it was a perfect day to go to Sea World.

 We got there and the kids went on a few kiddie rides and then begged to go into the splash park area. Since we knew we weren't staying for very long we let the kids get soaked. They were the only ones in the water area and they had a blast.

We went home and cooked our dinner of apetizers quickly and then opened Christmas jammies.

Bug is so happy to finally have matching jammies with a brother.

And the girls were thrilled with new nightgowns.

We did our nativity program again. Posing for the picture is the only thing that goes well for this. Lucy begged to play Mary so we decided Scotty should be Joseph. They ended up fighting over the doll the entire time so I was grateful we didn't wake up Rachel from her nap to play the part of baby Jesus. 

You guys, I didn't get a single picture from Christmas morning. The kids got a few awesome toys but the $35 Kindle Fires from Amazon and headphones stole the prize. The kids love them.

I made them all sign a contract about not complaining and the time limit rules. They all obliged and we are happy they quit borrowing our tablets. They all have linked up, even Lucy, to play Minecraft which is hilarious. Mallie one day told me she had to kill a sheep because it fell into her swimming pool and it was the only way to get it out.

December

My parents stayed with us through the first week of December. We dragged them all over San Antonio. One of our favorite activities, besides getting Shipleys Donuts every other day, was Top Golf.

 We loved having them with us for so long. I realized when they left I hadn't done laundry in over 2 weeks. They were my post partum angels. They got the kids to school every morning so I could sleep in. They made having 6 kids seem like a breeze. They also taught the ward What a treat to get them for so long before they head down to Africa on their mission.

My Mom bonded with her grandmother's namesake.

We went ice skating for the YW Christmas Party!

Our Bishop and his wife spoiled the kids and got their a gingerbread house kit.

Hannah got to decorate a gingerbread house at school.

Mallie grew a shark tooth.

 We drove around Windcrest and saw the most incredible Christmas Lights on not just one house but tons of houses throughout the entire city.

December was awesome!

Family Pictures

Once a year we doll ourselves up and get family pictures done. David never complains and is super helpful while I do hair and make everyone get their outfits approved. This year Ashton started to complain about taking pictures and David gave him a short talk about how this is what mom wants once a year so this is what we do for her. It was sweet to hear him say suck it up and do it for mom. This year we spent 20 minutes outside cold and trying to avoid mud... I was pretty sure by the end of the shoot our photographer didn't have much to work with. I was wrong. The results were pretty amazing and she made us look like a well groomed happy family...

The candid pictures were my favorites this year.

And if you think we got this picture on the bottom without some photoshopped heads you are crazy! Everyone looking in one direction and smiling would have been a miracle so I am grateful for the editing magic that went down to get us this gem. And David and Ashton will tell you how grateful they are that this happens once a year!

A Baptism and Baby Blessing

The 28th was a pretty special day for our family. Ashton was so excited to be baptized. He told the Bishop in his interview that we weren't making him be baptized but that he really did want to be baptized and it was his choice. Bishop also mentioned later that when he talked about getting to live in Heaven again because we are baptized Ashton said he was pretty excited about that because his Grandpa Marv was there. I always tell him that's one of the reasons that he was named Ashton so it's pretty special to hear that he feels that connection with him also. The baptism was awesome and Ashton even played "High On The Mountain Top" on the piano for the musical number.

So grateful for David being a worthy priesthood holder and a great Dad! After Ashton came out of the water and David hugged Ashton my heart wanted to burst. I love these two boys.

After Ashton was confirmed Rachel was blessed.

David's parents drove down and we were so happy to have them here.

My parents were here too and my Mom graciously did all the logistical stuff like making punch and setting out cookies so I didn't have to worry about that at all.

I always want to say I love"our little family". The kids are little but I guess we've grown far beyond little.

What a great day. The church of Jesus Christ is on the earth again and I am so grateful for that knowledge!

Ashton turns 8!

Birthdays are pretty mellow at our house. We let them pick out their dinner and somewhere fun to go but it's rare the kids have friend parties. David and I talked about letting Ashton do a friend party this year and we pulled off a surprise for him. My parents were in town so my Dad took Ashton to McDonalds while I picked up 3 of his friends. When he came back in he was shocked when he opened the door. It was hilarious. It took him a little while to get excited. David took the boys to go play laser tag while I stayed home. They had a blast.

Bad lighting but here he is with his budies.

Then they came home for cake and ice cream. Ashton is hilarious and smart. He keeps us on our toes with his negotiating skills. Sometimes I find myself debating with him and I have to stop myself and say he is 8 this isn't necessary. His Dad is his favorite playmate and he is a very responsible oldest kiddo. He loves to read and has become a pretty good little piano player in less than a year. He is always making up games for he and his buddies and sisters to play. I love this boy!!

Rachel's Newborn Pictures

A gal in the neighborhood offered to do newborn pictures for Rachel for free. None of my kids have ever had newborn pictures taken so this was a first for me. Newborn pictures take a LONG time but these are pretty darling.

It took a super long time to get her asleep in that moon. It was worth it.

Rachel Grace

I love the story of how Rachel got her name. I have heard about my Mom's grandmother Rachel Wills DeLaMare a lot. My mom begged me to use the name Rachel every time we found out I was pregnant with a girl. I always deflected and told her she had 4 daughters certainly if she loved the name that much she should have named a daughter Rachel! David also loved the name Rachel and would jump on my Mom's team every time it came up. I just didn't love the name Rachel because I've known so many Rachels growing up so we always came up with a different girl name. Well during the summer of 2014 while we stayed at my parent's house for 3 weeks while we waited to close on our San Antonio house I got really into family history. I went through every book my parent's owned and came across Rachel's journal. I spent a few late nights reading it cover to cover and I just loved her. As I was finishing it up one morning on the couch I came across her patriarchal blessing. In the blessing there was a line that hit me so strongly where it talked about how her name would be passed down from generation to generation and she would not be forgotten. I felt immediately that if we had another girl her name would be Rachel. As I told David and my Mom that I cried. I felt such a love for my great grandmother and knew we would be fulfilling apart of that blessing as no one else in her family line had used her name. Here is Robert DeLaMare and Rachel whom I adore.

Fast forward to the summer of 2015. We were again staying with my parents for a summer vacation and were talking about middle names for Rachel with my parents. My Dad brought up his grandmother Rachel Grace. We talked about her and how awesome it would be to be named after each of my grandfather's mothers. I also read about her in my Grandpa Marv's journal and David and I knew there wasn't a better middle name to fit with our Rachel.

Here is Marvin O. Ashton and Rachel Grace Jeremy.

So there it is. I'm amazed at how much my ancestors have played a role in this little girl's pregnancy and life so far. I know that Rachel was meant to be Rachel and come at this time because we had 3 other opportunities to name a girl Rachel but it wasn't mean to be. I love the spirit of Elijah that she brings into our family just by her name.

Halloween 2015

I just printed out our blog book from our time at Fort Leonard Wood and it's such a great family journal that I am even more motivated to document things. I almost forgot Halloween. I didn't want to buy costumes this year so I told the kids to find something out of the costume box. No one thought twice about getting a new costume this year and it made me wonder if I can get away with it next year too. Jeffrey and Debbie came down for Hallowen because they're moving out of Texas soon. We had a blast and I stayed up wait too late playing and then would wake up to feed a newborn every few hours. Not my wisest decision but oh so worth it.

Mallie was the only one that was determined she wanted to be something not in the box. She wanted so badly to be a witch so I rigged her up a black dress with some safety pins, ribbon and my black maxi skirt. She was thrilled and so was I. The hat is older than she is and way too big.

Not her best picture but her outfit is so darn cute that a friend gave me.

We even managed to squeeze in pumpkin carving. For 2.5 weeks post partum I'm impressed that Halloween went on the same as always.

This little boy screamed/cried every time we tried to put on his costume. Finally I had to give him candy before we even went trick or treating just to get him out the door. Oh parenting...

Happy Halloween!

Rachel's Birth Story

Lucy wins!!

On Wednesday the 7^th I woke up with contractions at about 3am and was convinced I was in labor. I cleaned the house got all packed up and then woke David up and told him to call into work. Around 5am the contractions stopped completely. I wasn’t thrilled but I thought she must be coming in the next few days and since David had already taken the day off we went out to lunch.

Turns out over the next week I had false labor every other day. Serious strong contractions that had me guessing every day whether or not I was in labor. David had the long holiday weekend starting on the 9^th and his paternity leave officially started on the 13^th so we were taking advantage of every day getting errands done and going out to eat with Lucy and Scotty in tow. We kept talking about how wonderful retired life would be when we get to be together every day. When Tuesday rolled around I was starting to get anxious as I thought about my post-partum time with him getting shorter and shorter. I had a good cry on the morning of the 14^th in frustration. You see post baby David and I prefer to do it on our own. We have a routine and he is so helpful that I don’t feel like we need Moms around. My mom and Dad were planning on coming down mid-November for Thanksgiving and Ashton’s baptism and I didn’t think I’d need them any sooner with all the time David had scheduled off. But as I thought about David only being home for 7 days I started to wonder if I could do it. I talked to Mom that morning who assured me she would come down the minute David went back to work if I needed her and would stay as long as I wanted. I had a new resolve that we were going to have the baby when we were supposed to and I needed to just be patient and let it go.

The night of the 14th I felt contractions again as I fell asleep but I didn’t think twice about it and at this point I had stopped telling David when they were coming because I didn’t want to get him excited. The morning of the 15th I woke up again surprised that I got a full night’s sleep with no sign of baby. David woke the kids up for school and came into me to do their hair and told me Mallie had pink eye. So we sent the oldest two off to school and I spent a good amount of time in the morning trying to get Mallie a doctor’s appointment on the airforce base to no avail. David and I had planned to go to the commissary early enough for him to come home, exercise, I could cut his hair all before he would go eat lunch at the school with Hannah at 11. So we headed to the commissary at 8:15. As we were waiting in the checkout line around 9am I felt some contractions that started to get more painful so I told David for the fourth time this pregnancy I think today might be the day. On the drive home David and I talked about how fun it would be to have a daytime baby for once. While we were unloading the groceries around 9:40 my neighbor and best bud Jessica, also the on call labor babysitter, yelled across the street “Do some jumping jacks!” and I said “they’re 12 minutes apart I’m hopeful I’ll call you around 1pm to come watch the kids!” Just then the nurse from the pediatrician’s office called me back and asked if I could come in at 11 with Mallie. I told her I thought I was in early labor and she said “Okay come in right now!” so I drove right back to the air force base where we had just left. By 10:30 Mallie had been checked out and we were waiting at the pharmacy for her eye drops. I texted David in the parking lot at 10:38am and said, “This is it – if we go in now I’ll probably have time for the epidural.”

When I got home close to 11 I texted Jessica and asked her to come over in the next 15 minutes and David and I got ready to go to the hospital. The contractions were coming every 7 minutes or so and the minute Jessica walked in I had a really strong long contraction so I knew we needed to go into the hospital. But as soon as we got in the car they slowed down again. The whole 25 minute drive down there I only had two mildish contractions. I started to panic again wondering if we were going in way too early. I kept saying to myself, I hope I’m at a 6 at least. Then as we were walking into the hospital I had several strong contractions and felt confident this was not false labor.

As we got up to L&D they had us wait for a few minutes in the waiting room and the contractions had started again and were so strong I couldn’t even sit down. Then they told me to come back into a pre check in room by myself. As I walked in the little prenatal room the nurse who looked new said, “Can you give a urine sample before I hook you up to the monitors?” and I looked at her like she was crazy. I said, “Can’t you just check me? I promise this is going to go fast.” She looked around like she didn’t know what to do with me and then a second nurse came in and took charge and said, “this is her 6^th kid let me just check her.” As she was checking me she had a shocked look on her face and said, “Well there is the head and bulging bag of waters and I can’t feel any cervix.” So she called to the real L&D unit and next thing I know I’m in a wheel chair being rolled down the hallway. I see one of the midwives I had seen at an appointment and she said, “I cannot believe you are this happy and complete. I don’t believe you’re even in labor.”

She checks me again confirms I’m ready to go and says I have to do all the paperwork to officially admit you but then let’s break your water and have a baby. I say “yes” and then tell someone to grab David out of the waiting room and a million people come in my room. Ft. Sam Houston is a training hospital so there were several student nurses and a med student in the room they all keep commenting that I’m so happy and normal and that they’ve never seen this before. As I’m putting on the gown in the bathroom I hear a nurse say to the other students, “You will never see a patient this calm and far into labor like this ever again. This doesn’t happen.” I laugh and am still shocked I’m at a 10 and contractions aren’t coming too often so I’m reminded of Scotty’s birth that I stalled out on for an hour. I’m dreading that but mentally I’m gearing up for another little while in labor. 

I don’t know what they had to do to actually get me checked in on the computers but it took a good 20 minutes.David comes in and I’m so relieved to see him. Finally I have a couple of strong contractions and lean against David’s chest as he rubs my back.  He brought in my phone and as usual my mom has a knack for knowing when I’m in labor I see that I got a text from her at 12:30 when I was in the check in room that said, “Just checking in how are you?”  I text her back at 12:42 and say “at the hospital and complete”. A few minutes later a new midwife comes back and asks if I want my water broken. I say, “Yes” and she does. Then she tells me I can push in whatever position I want. I told her I’d like to get on my hands and knees and I steady myself and wait for a minute or so until I feel a contraction. I didn’t make any noises or anything I just started to push and reached down ready to grab her head that I felt coming. All the sudden I heard a nurse ask me shocked, “Can you feel her coming out?” I half answered yes as I felt her head slide out and I felt the energy in the room start to shift as people realized she was coming now! Then her body came sliding right out from my hands into the midwives  at 12:56pm. They held her behind me and awkwardly tried to cut the cord as I sat there on my knees turned around watching. They put her immediately on my chest and gave me the bulb to suck her out on my own. I looked at David shocked. Even for me this delivery was incredibly fast. I feel like I had a mental break through on how to push out a baby. That sounds so weird since I had already done it 5 times but I feel like I can truly identify the feeling of the exact moment she was ready to be pushed out and boom it was done! It helped that she was little but man oh man was I ready to just have her here after so many false labors. All the nurses kept telling me that they’ve never seen anything like it. I looked at David and said, “I am so so relieved to finally have her out!”

It’s hospital policy to give you a full hour from the birth before they ever take a baby out of the mother’s arms. She was covered in vernix so I wiped her down and just snuggled her for a good 30 minutes before I handed her off to David so I could go to the bathroom. After an hour they came in and weighed, measured and bathed her and she came in at 7lbs 4oz and 20 inches long. I felt bad I was so anxious for her to come early since she would have not even broken 7lbs a week earlier. She came as soon as she could while still being a healthy size. Because I had a full night’s sleep before I felt so rested and awesome during the whole first day at the hospital. I always long to be at home but for once the night in the hospital wasn’t painful and David got to bring the kids down when she was just 5 hours old. Their reaction has truly been a highlight of this whole process. They walked in and said and all said “Mom!!” “Rachel!!” “Congratulations!!” It’s amazing the difference of just 20 months from Scotty’s birth on how excited and aware they were of Rachel’s birth. They were thrilled. They each got to hold her and were truly in love. Even Scotty kept holding his arms out to get another turn. Make me realize why people don’t mind an age gap because it is magical to see older siblings dote on their little baby siblings. It was the cutest thing ever. I’ll have to write a post on Rachel’s name later. But there is the birth story finally written up!

Rachel's first pictures

First selfie with Rachel

She locked eyes with David right away.

Little fingers.

First smile.

All the Jacobson kids. This is always my favorite picture when a new baby arrives. The kids were beside themselves with excitement as they walked in to meet her.

Scotty couldn't get enough of her and kept whining until he could hold her.

Excited Sisters.