"Randomness"

Well just some random pictures and things.

Ella woke up one night as we were giving Jacob a bath. She wanted to have her picture with him. He was oh so impressed.

Yesterday was our first outing on the boat this year. Ella was very excited. She could not wait to get on the boat. The lake is still pretty cold for swimming, about 58 degrees. So we just rode around and Ella got to practice her casting for fishing. Jacob was again oh so impressed. When then wind would hit him in the face he would stick out his tongue like a snake tasting the wind. It was really cute.

That is it for now. Hope you all have a wonderful Memorial Day Weekend.

Crazy

Well Ella was in to the Doctor on Saturday for an ear infection. Then Jacob was in yesterday because he is not digesting the breast milk well. He is now on medicine for acid reflux. Monday night I was up all night with him. Then last night we were up with Ella. The other ear was bothering her and she was is some bad pain. So off to the doctor again today for her and then for me. I just want to check in on me and make sure that all is o.k. So again another busy day. Going from one to two is quite the change. I am hoping to get a handle on it soon.

Ella's Happenings

At dance Ella had Tutu day. She was very excited about this. She is doing very well in dance. She has a recital coming up in June. The costumes have started to arrive and the excitement is building.

Now on to Ella's new room. She "helped" a lot. She helped with the washing, painting, and decorating.

These are the color choices for the room.

To give perspective. The pink is the top half of the room and the brown is the bottom half. We left the ceiling and trim white.

My Mom and I envisioned curtains that would have brown and pink strips or polka dots. Well Ella had another vision. She fell in love with this material at the store and could not leave it.

There was even enough for Mom to make a skirt for her. It is for dance, but she had to put it together in an outfit the day she got it.

This was the big reveal. She did not see the room the last day until it was all done and ready for her. So some of the decorations were a surprise to her.

Thanks Mom for all of your help. We never would have gotten this done without you.

The day that we revealed the room to her she and Daddy went on a date together. She had earned a personal pan pizza from Pizza Hut. This is how the looked before they left.

Then there was mud day outside. She had a blast. Not so much fun cleaning it up, but she had a good time.

Grandma Mary treated Ella and I to pedicures. That was a lot of fun. First off my feet really needed it, and it was Ella's first time. She had a ball. She picked pink polish of course for her and green for me. The ladies did flower details on her big toes and she thought that was just the nuts.

See I told you green. Then with the size of my feet. The swelling was so bad at the end they looked like Ogre feet. Big and Green.

Thank you Grandma that was a great treat for all.

We also spent an afternoon with friends at a jumpy house. Ella had a blast. Thank you Joanne for helping with Ella. There was no way I was getting in and out of those houses.

Then along came the Easter Bunny. Ella was still afraid of him this year.

We decorated eggs and Ella drew a picture for the Easter Bunny and left it with some carrots and water for him.

Then Easter morning the Bunny left a note for Ella that told her about two egg hunts one inside and one outside. This is Ella and Daddy checking out the loot.

During this time Ella also went to a maple festival and saw how they make maple syrup. She was very interested, because Uncle Howard had made some for her. Thanks again Uncle Howard.

She went shopping one day with Mommy and Daddy and helped pick out the coming home outfit for the baby and also made a stuffed dog for her new baby at Build a Bear Workshop.

Well that catches you up on what has been going on.

Baby Sister Mom Dad Update

First of all thank you to Cammie for updating while I was in the hospital. We are all doing well. Trying to make this adjustment from one to two is not easy. Jacob is doing great. He had a doctor's appointment last Friday and weighed 7.8 pounds. That was almost a one pound weight gain from our discharge. Then this Thursday he had a clogged tear duct. They weighed him again and he now weighs 7.13 lbs. So his new name is Piggy. It took Ella forever to get to that weight.

On to Ella. She is hanging in there. She loves her little brother very much sometimes too much. She prefers to think of herself as the mother, but we correct her and let her know that she has a very important job as a big sister and that she is the only one who can do that job. Now as far as how she is dealing with Luke and I she is giving us a run for our money. She really seems to have the attitude of 4 going on 14. Oh well the joys of parenthood.

As for Luke and I we are hanging in there as well. Jacob is a pretty good baby. He does stay up more at night then Ella did, but we are handling it. Luke heads back to work on Monday. It feels like he had bearly any time off this time around. I am still not able to drive next week so Luke and Grandpa will be taking Ella to and from school. This part has been hard on me. I feel very disconnected from Ella's school, and I hate to be trapped. Three weeks is a long time to not be able to get around on your own. Especially for a control freak like me.

Well enough with the words here are some pictures for you all.

Well more posts are to come. I would like to get one together on Ella she has done some pretty cool stuff over the last few months and I just did not get it on here. So keep tuned in.

Pictures!

Here's big sister holding her new baby brother. I'm told Ella is doing as well as can be expected considering she was absolutely certain she was getting a baby sister!

And here's cutie patootie himself:

It's A........

BOY!

Welcome Jacob Samuel!

April 19th, 2009 6:45am
7 pounds, 3 ounces
20 inches long

This is Irene's friend Cammie. She asked me to inform you all that baby Varga, now known as Jacob Samuel has arrived! Apparently, just like his sister, he was not going to stick with a pre-scheduled date (she had a scheduled c-section planned for tomorrow morning) and arrived on his own terms at 6:45 this morning. When I talked to her last night, she was having a few contractions, but by midnight was having about one an hour. By 3am they were on their way to the hospital where the little monkey apparently kicked through and broke the water. Anyways, everyone is doing well....tired, but well. They are going to try and send a few pictures later, so be on the lookout!

Ella is famous again

O.k. so I have not been good about keeping up on this, but in my defense I am 39 months pregnant. So this was a class that we took Ella to and they did a newspaper article on her. She was very excited about it.

How To Be a Big Sister
AMH preparation course prepares siblings for the new arrival

By Linda Ober
Contributing Editor

Four-and-a-half-year-old Ella Varga comes to class dressed for the occasion, proudly wearing a long-sleeved brown shirt that announces her new role come April 20: "Big Sister."

The minute Ella walks into the classroom in the Auburn Memorial Hospital Maternity Unit, her shyness disappears, and she gravitates toward the baby doll resting on the table.

"She's a good big sister already. Look at that – she knows," Registered Nurse Debra Oliveras says as Ella gently picks up the doll and cradles it in her tiny arms.

Oliveras has taught the sibling preparation course at AMH for the last decade.

Parents Irene and Luke Varga, of Auburn, wanted Ella to take the class because their daughter hasn't had exposure to newborns, and because they noticed that Ella had started acting out at times due to her anxiety with having a younger brother or sister (the sex will be a surprise when Irene undergoes a C-section at AMH).

The idea behind the program is to offer siblings-to-be a sneak peak of what the new baby will and won't do and how the older child can be helpful to both the baby and the parents.

"(It's) just so that they're not surprised when the baby comes, and that they don't resent the baby," Oliveras says.

The class, which is free to those delivering at AMH, also focuses on safety. In one activity, Oliveras asks Ella to pull various items out of a plastic container and determine whether or not they would be a safe toy for her new sibling.

A small, soft duck stuffed animal?

"This would be OK," Ella says matter-of-factly.

"What do you think about that?" Oliveras asks, holding up a deflated red balloon.

"No!" Ella replies seriously.

"Boy, you are good at this," Oliveras says in her soft-spoken manner. "I can't stump you at all."

The main event of the one-hour class is a project in which the child decorates a photo of himself or herself. This craft will then be hung in the newborn's crib.

"The baby can't see, but they don't know that," Oliveras says with a laugh. "It makes them [the older sibling] feel important."

Armed with a purple marker, Ella carefully pens E-l-l-a, the latter letter backwards.

"I'll write my name so that the baby knows who it's from," she says.

Placing music-note stickers on her photo, she explains that she's "singing to the baby" and breaks out into an original version of "Rockabye Baby."

Oliveras then takes the Varga family on a tour of the maternity unit. There are no newborns on this day, and Ella has an all-access pass to the nursery.

After asking questions about the machines and taking a look at the scale, she sits in the same rocking chair that her father held her in as a newborn just four years ago.

"She's a very loving little girl," Luke says of his daughter.

After the class, Oliveras presents Ella with a certificate of graduation. "Congratulations Ella," it reads. "You are ready to be a big sister."

Irene believes this is true.

"She likes to help, so if we play on that aspect of it…then I think she'll do OK," Irene says of Ella's older sibling duties.

One thing she won't be allowed to do, however, is name the newborn. Ella is convinced that Mom is having another girl, and Ella's got the name all picked out.

Princess Pretty.