Pictures from Hospital

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One of the most beautiful moments in life...

As most of you know (if any one is even reading this).  My sister finally, FINALLY had her baby!!!  Madalynn Nicole Mott, born 9/1/13 at 7:08pm .  She was 6 lbs & 13oz and 19.5 inches long.  She has a full head of hair and she is absolutely beautiful!  I LOVE HER!  I didn't know I could love another baby like I do her.  I would do anything for her like I would my own child.  She is amazing and special and so damn lovable!

This whole experience has been amazing.  Honestly we or I didn't know if my sister would ever  be able to have children.  So this little girl was quite the miracle baby!  I will always remember talks with my sister of our dreams of having children and them growing up together and how close they will be because she and I are so close.  We have longed for this day!  We have waited for this day!  This day is finally here!

I drove out to Nebraska on Friday before labor day because the doc finally told her they would induce her that following Tuesday if she doesn't go into labor over the weekend.  Well she did.  She started having contractions late Saturday night, early Sunday morning.  We took off for the hospital about 4:30am.  Her contractions started slowing down at one point and the doctor asked if she wanted to go ahead and induce.  (UH, YA!)  

At first it seemed like things were progressing so slowly.  Brayden and I slept in the family waiting for another 3 or 4 hours I think. Then we got up and were able to go check on my sister.

This was such an amazing experience to me.  Watching my own sister go through this whole birthing process.  I learned more about my sister in one day it seemed than I have my whole life.  First of all my sister is beautiful and kind and I knew she would be this amazing mother.  But what I didn't know was how strong she was and is.  The first STRONG contraction she had and started to cry, I started crying right with her.  I was hurting for her.  I didn't feel like it was fair that she was going through so much pain.  Every contraction she had and I could see she was in pain the harder it was for me to hold back the tears.  But she dealt with it.  She would get through one contraction and catch her breath and gear up for the next one. (This is all with no pain meds mind you!)  Finally at about 5 centimeters they offered the epidural.  Hallelujah! (I WANTED ONE TOO!)  She was now being heard through the halls and it was awful!  I wanted the pain to just stop for her.  By the time they had given her the epidural she was already 8 centimeters.  What she or anybody else for that matter didn't know, it was now to late and she was about to feel EVERYTHING anyway!

My sister was AMAZING!!!  She pushed and pushed and pushed and suffered and suffered and suffered in so much pain.  BUT she kept on going and at the point of thinking she could not do this anymore, she would say okay, here comes another one and she would push some more!  I don't know how to describe this well, but it was truly amazing to see her strength in those moments of total fear.  Like you feel like you are dying and not sure if you are going to even make it to see your baby.  And yet you will do everything in your power to push this beautiful baby out into the world.  My sister did such a good job and she tried with all her might!  The baby started to have a little distress so the doctor thought it would be best for a C-Section.

(by the way daddy was quite supportive through all of this!

I will never forget this day, and all the emotions and the pain I could only imagine (wait, I don't have to imagine, I know because my epidural wore off and I felt EVERYTHING!) that my sister felt!  She is stronger then I ever knew her to be and I totally admire her for that!

Now baby Maddy is here and it is such an awesome experience to see mommy and daddy being, mommy and daddy.  They are both doing so great at this.  They are both so exhausted and again, emotions are flyin high with all that is new here.  But it is a beautiful family and Madalynn is so lucky to have the mommy & daddy that she has!  UH, and lucky to have me for her Aunt!  And yes I am a ZIA now too!  YAY!!!

(Pictures coming soon!)

Camping Trip and Park

We took Brayden back up to our spot we went camping at last time.  He is such a good camper and loves the outdoors and nature!  Gary took the day off on Friday and we headed up early.  Although the campground was almost empty, I think most people are done for the year since school is starting.  It was beautiful weather the whole time.  We just hung around camp and did some hiking and fishing.  The first few days were a bit rough with Brayden and his potty training.  He has been in big boy underwear for a few weeks with little to no accidents.  We got up there and I felt like we were starting all over.  I think it was just all to new and he didn't like not having a toilet with running water. LOL... by  the last day he was good to go!  Oh well.  On Saturday Gary's folks and sister came up for dinner and we went on a little hike with them also.  On our hike we ran into 2 HUGE bull moose.  It was pretty amazing and almost frightening at the same time. We were pretty much right up on them.  AmAzing!

We had a great time and headed home Sunday.  Gary took a detour on the way home and we got to see some beautiful sides of the mountains that we have never seen before.  We found a new campground that we may go try out next time!  Another successful weekend in the mountains!

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On Monday night we enjoyed an evening at the park!

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My 3 1/2 year old!!!

Each day I am in such amazement of Brayden.  He is growing and learning so so much!  We have had such a busy fun summer!  And he is seriously one of the funniest kids I know!  He has quite the personality!  He makes funny faces to make you laugh and loves to joke around with you!  He is also very very stubborn, and is always wanting to be first in everything he does. (I mean like even walking down our stairs to go somewhere or walking into the kitchen to get his milk.) He always has to be in front of you.  Never behind.  He yells out, "I want to be the leader!!!" (Sometimes it gets a little annoying LOL)

His favorites:

DINO Dan - I really want to shoot myself in the foot every time I have to watch this, but hey it makes him happy!

Mike the Knight

Jake and the Neverland Pirates - This is what he wants to be for Halloween, guess I better get this costume figured out!

Cars

Trains

Horses

Dinosaurs - He knows pretty much every single dino's name, it amazes me that he can pronounce half of them!

Swimming

He is now about 41.5 inches tall and weighs just the same!  Crazy!  

OH AND FINALLY, FINALLY... he is potty training.  We have had a very hard and trying time with this.  But we now have him in big boy underwear and I would say we are 90% of the way there.  He still will have a few days where he will have accidents.  But we are completely out of diapers!  YAY!!!

This fall he will be going to preschool (yes I said it!)  Just a couple days a week for only couple hours at the rec center!  I think it will be good for him to make some friends!  He is so excited!  

We have taken it pretty easy these last few weeks after all the fam went home and now the baby shower fun is over.  We are now anxiously awaiting the phone call letting us know the baby is coming!

In the past few weeks we did the Museum and went to the Adams County Fair!  Brayden as usual, had a great time!

My first Moose in Colorado!

Last weekend Gary and I went on a camping trip while Brayden stayed home with Grammy and camped out in the backyard.

I had seen pictures, of a friend of mine on Facebook, of her camping trip and the area looked absolutely beautiful.   I told Gary about it and we were totally up for the adventure.  All we knew from what she told me was she camped on the west side of Chambers Lake.  No campground.  So we took off Friday morning looking for our spot to camp.  Unfortunately you can't have open fires so we packed no firewood! :(  It took us about 3 hours.  We first drove past Chambers lake a ways looking for a road that would even take us on the west side of Chambers Lake.  Couldn't find and just kept driving ...

On the drive a deer ran across the road in front of the car in front of us.  So of course we all stopped to watch the deer.  He was gone up the hill.  My husband in the meantime was looking out over the meadow on the opposite side and spotted a big Moose.  I was so EXCITED!  Everyone keeps telling me how many moose they see here in Colorado.  And in my whole life of living here I have never seen them.  I love this animal and just think they are so fascinating so I was pretty happy that we got to see one.  Not just one there were 2 standing together!  Pretty cool!

After watching them for awhile we took off back toward Chambers Lake looking for a camp spot.  The lake campground was completely booked so we drove down the road that goes north of chambers and ran into this beautiful little campground that is pretty tucked away.  It is first come first serve and we got there early enough that we were able to get a great spot!  There was a river and pretty little hiking trail that runs right through the campground.

Our first night we just set up camp and walked around the river and the trail a bit.  OH and since we were in a campground we could have fires!  YAY!!  SMORE'S!! (I won't be able to have these for awhile so I was pretty happy!)  Saturday we wanted to go fishing but because we had driven so far the day before we needed to get gas.  According to our GPS it was only 17 miles to the closest station.  We started that way and kept going and going and going.  We ended up on this dirt road and the GPS kept reconverting to an even further point.  The drive was absolutely beautiful!  We ended up in Walden.  Ya I have never heard of it either.  Filled up on gas and took the highway back that we should have taken.  On our way back we stopped at the Moose Visitor Center.  They have a big board in there that all the rangers write on saying the last place they saw moose and what time.  Kind of cool I thought.  Although you don't really need to look at it. We learned that the area we were in is known as Moose capital of Colorado.  On our way to the lake to fish we saw a bunch of cars stopping.  MOOSE, AGAIN!  There were 3 this time.  They were in this area that had a bunch of hiking trails.  All 3 were down in this meadow below the trails.  So Gary and I thought we would go up behind them on the trails so I could get some pictures.  We walked back in but couldn't get any good shots and didn't see any of them.  On our way back though at one point I looked to my left and not maybe 30 feet away is one of the moose.  I got a few shots and he looked up but then started charging at us!  AHHHH!  Gary took off on the trail back and I just ran for the closest trees behind me.  He went right past me and of course I'm trying to snap shots as he is doing so!  I felt safe where I was at.  The shots were a bit blurry due to my shaking hands, and I couldn't stop laughing(that's what I do when I'm nervous), and trying to hold my bladder!  I seriously almost pee'd my pants!  LOVED IT!  I would do this all over again!

Needless to say we didn't get much fishing in.  We stopped at a little lake and there were way to many flies for me so I wanted to just pack it up and go back to camp!  We enjoyed a nice steak dinner back at camp and then went on a little hike.  After the hike it started sprinkling a little bit.  So we put up a tarp between the trees and took cover next to the fire!  It was nice and warm and cozy!

Sunday - RAIN.  We woke up to it, we had to pack up in it, and we had to drive home in it.  BUT, I didn't care.  We just had such a nice weekend and it was so pretty up there.  The only thing  missing was Brayden.  So we are going back to the same place in a couple weekends and bringing our boy with us this time!!  I hope we have the same luck with seeing all the moose!