Better Late than Never!

After 20 hours of getting to the hospital Mr. Andrew Isaac Raquet graced us with his presence. Dawn had to be at the hospital at 7:00 Tuesday morning (2/26/08) and was induced and then finally at 3:10 am Wednesday morning (2/27/08) "Drew" was born. He weighed in at a healthy 7 lbs 11.5 ounces and was 20 inches long. He has some dark hair and is absouletly handsome. Mom, dad, Alli, and Andrew are all doing wonderful. Everyone is very tired because it was a very long day but we all survived and we are enjoying Drew. He is a very good baby and when he has been awake he has been very alert and quiet! Alli decided that she wanted to take the baby home so I guess for now he is a keeper! I'll post more later and get some better pictures but I wanted to at least let everyone know he is here!

Just one more day!

Well we are now down to the wire. Dawn took today off and had a special day with Alli. They went to Chuck E Cheese's for lunch and to play games and then they went to Meijer to see Adam and Alli was going to get a special present for the baby. It was a tough decision and her first choice was that she should get the Sharpay doll with the golf cart from High School Musical and that her baby brother could get the Gabriella doll with the pool because she thought her baby brother would like it (yeah right). In the end she found a stuffed bear that giggles.

After I got off work today I treated Dawn to a manicure and pedicure so that she could relax and at least have her toes and fingers look pretty. She was very excited because she said that she was going to have Alli paint her toenails because she couldn't reach them. After our mani and pedi's we met Adam, Alli, and Adam's parents for dinner and then went back to Dawn and Adam's house. We had a celebration of sorts because tonight was the last shot that Dawn had to take. After 8 1/2 months of shots both Dawn & Adam were very excited about being done. Alli is always a big helper and she does the alcohol wipe before the shot is given. (By the way that is just Alli's babydoll in the first picture and not a real baby.

Well I better sign off for now because we have to be at the hospital at 6:30 in the morning to get ready for Mr. Andrew!

Watch out Mary Lou Retton!

Alli started taking gymnastics at Fun & Fitness about 1 year ago and Alli has done really well and has moved up a couple of levels from when she started. Currently she is in the 5-7 year old class even though she is only 4 and the youngest in her class (I'm not proud or anything!). There are a couple of other girls that are in her class that she has been with since almost the beginning and they are all so cute. They are actually better than the 6 year olds. Alli can do somersaults, straddle rolls, backward rolls, handstands, cartwheels (very, very nice ones), bridges, and can do a backbend with a kickover with a little spot. They have started doing backhand springs with a spot as well. They have been working on forward rolls and cartwheels on the balance beam which I would think would be very scary but these little ones have no fear.

Tonight they had an exhibition for all the family and friends so that they could show off what they could do. Unfortunately Alli has a bad cold and wasn't feeling real well and it seemed that she got hurt on everything she did - she did however do some really good cartwheels! When they got finished they all received their "gold medals". (Sorry the pictures are blurry and dark but it was hard to get good pictures.)

Happy Valentines Day!

We were all kind of hoping that we would have a certain little boy here for Valentines Day but since that didn't happen yet we decided to take the kids out to eat. We bypassed the romantic dinner and decided to go to Buffalo Wild Wings because I love their teriayki wings. Ron, Crystal, Dawn, Adam, Alli and I went and since Todd had to work we decided that we would go to the Buffalo Wild Wings where he works at County Line and Emerson so that he could kind of be with us (sorry you couldn't eat with us Todd). Unfortunately the service was horrible and it took us over 45 minutes to get our food and our waitress wasn't the least bit concerned about it (Todd was not waiting on us so it was not his fault). Ron had to be bowling and so once we got our food he only had about 15 minutes to eat. All in all it was a good night because we got to enjoy our time together except baby Andrew's mommy was starving and wanted food and when you have someone who is 8 1/2 months pregnant you don't want to keep them waiting!

We gave Alli the present of her life time - a High School Musical T-Shirt. She was so cute, she just kept wanting to look at it and asked her mom if she could wear it to pre-school tomorrow. Dawn tries not to put some of her best clothes on her at school because they do a lot of projects and get their clothes pretty messy and Friday is pizza and ice cream day and Alli is not the neatest of eaters so she told Alli that maybe she should wait and wear it a different day. Alli thought about it for a while and came up with a wonderful solution - she could wear a shirt under her new shirt and then at lunch time and project time she could take her new t-shirt off and put it in her backpack and then when she was finished she could put her new t-shirt back on. I guess where theres a will theres a way!

The next Leonardo Da Vinci

We were getting ready for Dawn's baby shower a couple of weeks ago and Alli wanted to help decorate so she decided to draw some pictures that she could hang up. She drew a picture of her mommy and her baby brother.

I just loved this picture and I think she did a great job. She can draw much better than I can.

Here is a picture that I took tonight of Dawn (you can definitely see the resemblance to Alli's picture).

As you can see, Dawn is more than ready for this baby to get here. Only 2 weeks to go and we are all getting very excited

Not long now!

Well we have a date for the induction of Mr. Andrew Raquet. Dawn will be induced on Tuesday, February 26, 2008. Hopefully he won't take as long as Alli did after her inducement (is that a word?). Dawn had an ultrasound today and the doctor said everything looked really good and that he is already about 7 pounds 2 oz, so in another 2 1/2 weeks he will probably grow a little more than a pound so he will be around 8 1/2 pounds. Thank goodness she is being induced 2 weeks early otherwise he would be about 9 1/2 pounds. I think Dawn is more than ready for "Drew" to get here because she is now at that "I'm getting miserable" point and can't get comfortable. Adam & I painted the room a couple of weeks ago and we had a baby shower last week so I think they are just about set for him to be born. We went and toured St. Francis hospital on Wednesday so now Adam knows a little more what to expect. He doesn't like hospitals very much so we will see how this goes. Alli is getting very excited about her new baby brother. Hopefully that excitement will continue once he is here! I'll keep you posted on the baby watch and let you know how she is doing!

A Fond Farewell

It has been a rather sad week for us. My Uncle Don (my dad's last living brother) passed away on Sunday, January 27, 2008. My uncle was 86 years old and was one of the nicest guys you would ever want to meet. He was married to my Aunt Gerry (who will be 93 next month) for 59 years. They were probably as close as any married couple I have ever seen. They did everything together and were so sweet together. He was buried yesterday, February 1, 2008. Uncle Don, you will truly be missed and I love you very much!

The one nice thing that came out of all of this was that as my Dad and I were driving home from the funeral home last Sunday he asked if I wanted to see where he and my mom lived when they had met. In forty some years I have never seen where they lived, and in fact I thought they lived in Muncie which is where my mom grew up. I didn't know it was right here in Indy. We went by and saw the house my mom lived in and he used to live right behind her but the house he lived in was torn down. After that we went by the house that I lived in when I was first born, and once again it is something I hadn't seen before. We then went by the house that I remember growing up in when I was in school and went by the grade school I went to when I was little. I told my dad that I couldn't believe that they moved my grade school because I remember when growing up that mom would walk us to school and it was at least a mile but now the school was only about a block away so they had to have moved it! It was so nice taking that trip down memory lane and spending that time with my dad. I really enjoyed it, thank you dad!