7 months

Reese, we sure are loving being your parents! Every day your dad comes home, picks you up and says, Mama...isn't she the most beautiful girl you've ever seen? We are so thankful for your little life and pray for you daily...that you might come to understand and hate your sin and see your desperate need for our Savior, Jesus Christ. We are starting to see that sinful nature come out more and more and with it we pray we would always parent you by God's Word...so that He would be lovely in your eyes!

These are some of the things you've been up to this past month:

• Sitting up all by yourself! (October 11th)
• Experienced both 113 degree heat and thunder, lightening, and hail all in the same month!
• You LOVE to be held and are a great cuddler
• You went to the nursery at church for the first time this month
• You got your first cold...:( and then passed it along to mom too
• You like car rides and watching things pass by the window
• Your pacifier is still your favorite...you laugh and kick your legs every time you see it
• You weigh 15.6 lbs and have two teeth
• Even though it's not your favorite thing to do...you've gotten the eating solids thing down pretty good

Happy 7 months Reesie girl!

Fall has arrived in California...

We have been looking forward to the {real} beginning of fall and the weather has decided to finally cooperate with the calendar... so in honor of fall here's what's happening in the Mehringer home today!

Vegetable Beef Stew from scratch

Can't wait to get these Whole Wheat Blueberry Banana Muffins

 in my oven to compliment dinner.

This is lit on my kitchen table.

And this little munchkin was enjoying squash today...

Happy Fall Everyone!

It Finally Fits!

I bought this outfit for my sister Elise when I was a Junior in college. I finally had that living baby (girl) doll I had wanted since I was 10 (I was 5 when my sister Diana was born and a little too young to fully appreciate having a baby in the house) and I frequented the baby stores on my study breaks just to see what I could bring home for her. Well this is the outfit I chose and when Elise was 2 months old I flew home on spring break and had this in my bag.

Ever since finding out I was having my own little girl, I couldn't wait to put this outfit on her. It's not all that extravagant or amazing...just special because Elise wore it. Well...it took a lot longer for my baby to grow into it...say 5 months more! Reese is a petite little gal! I'm not sure where she gets it from (probably from Matt's side of the family) because we Ryan's were big babies! But it makes my heart happy that she can now wear it and it's even cooled off enough for long sleeves and pants to be necessary.

She's even getting the hang of smiling for the camera! :)

Game Day!

Saturday has been highly anticipated in our home. Not just because it's Saturday, although having dad home from work is a wonderful change from not seeing him till evening Monday through Friday. Not just because it's the day that Matt lets me get out of the house for some much needed R&R from the little kid, although shopping for food, grabbing coffee at Coffee Bean and moseying around Walmart by myself puts a smile on my face.

No, it was highly anticipated because it was the day set for Matt's beloved football team, the Auburn Tigers to play his brother Tad's favorite team, the Arkansas Razorbacks. Tad and Matt both are big time football fans! They look forward to fall more then a kid counting down to Christmas. You'll find them hovering over stats and plays long before the teams come together to begin fall practice. There is no end to how many ESPN articles will be read, analyzed and discussed when it refers to the South Eastern Conference and their respective teams. So you can see it was a big event to be playing each other and let's just say it's probably a good thing the brothers were watching the game from different places. The Tigers brought a victory to their team and now hold a 7-0 record. For this house at least...there was much to celebrate Saturday night!

Reese's 1st Party!

This past Saturday Reese was invited to her first birthday party to help celebrate Bailey Brown turning 3! Even though she arrived 2 hours late due to a much needed nap, Reese enjoyed a great party and Kristin (Bailey's mom) did an amazing job putting everything together.

What an amazing mom...all those characters on sticks
were cake pops made by Kristin herself!

Reese with the birthday girl!

Kristin and I were pregnant at the same time with Malachi and Reese. Malachi came 7 days early and Reese was 3 days late so they are now 11 days apart. Here's a picture taken back in February at my shower.

Our first picture together with these two babies on the outside! :) It's so fun to have a friend with a baby in the exact same place just to compare and ask questions. Malachi is a little farther ahead in sitting up and wanting to crawl. Reese is taking her time in both those areas.

Malachi not so sure about what he thinks of this other baby.

Happy Birthday, Bailey! We sure enjoyed coming to your party and celebrating with you.

Family in Town

A few weeks back my family from Alaska was able to get in a quick trip to visit us! Now that Reese is here it's all the more motivation for them to come down and dote on their granddaughter/ niece. We squeezed out every moment of the full two days they were here...from a walk to Castaic park, two afternoons of pool time, a Menchie's (frozen yogurt) visit and dinners at both Stonefire and Sisley's we loved every moment! Here are a few pictures capturing our time together.

Laughing with Nana and Uncle Joe

Playing with Poppy and Aunt Elise

Poor Uncle Tom...Reese was ready for bed here!

Something I have really enjoyed about being the oldest and starting my family first is seeing all of my siblings with my baby. It blesses my heart to watch them enjoy her and for Reese to have fun with them. She is especially drawn to Elise being that Elise is a smaller version of all the big people in her life. :) The only problem is how far away Alaska is...I wish these times could happen weekly instead of every 3 months or so. I'm so thankful you all were here, though, and I can't wait for the next visit!

Prayer Group

This post isn't really in any sort of order but I couldn't go long without posting about my precious, amazing, wonderful, faithful and godly prayer group girls! We started meeting together once a week to share prayer requests shortly after returning from our semester together in Israel almost 8 years ago and we haven't stopped since! God has done incredible things through these women! We have prayed for 5 going on 6 ;) relationships, dating, engagements, wedding showers,  graduating from college, 4 of us living together in one apartment :), our weddings, pregnancies that made 3 of us mommies, baby showers, moving out of town, moving across the WoRlD to Africa and the list goes on! We are open, honest, vulnerable, full of encouragement and exhortation to one another and God has truly been so kind to bring us together.

The hard part about praying is that the Lord answers these request...I know, that's a good thing!...but it has now taken 3 of us away. Heather and Aimee are overseas in various places of ministry and Abi is out of town learning to be a new wife to her husband Issa! That leaves 3 of us here...and although we wouldn't wish them away from doing what they love, we sure do miss them and feel incomplete! Girls, I'm so thankful for each of you and as I type this I get a little teary-eyed to think of the overwhelming blessings and love God has poured out on my life because of you 5! 

Sorry that these next two are grainy but they're from awhile back and I like them. :) We've shared many moments together...this one happens to be celebrating Aimee's birthday at her favorite, Claim Jumper!

I love you girls! Thanks for being dearest friends to me and I'm so thankful to know that even being oceans apart won't keep us from staying close!

March 21, 2010

So many thoughts flood my mind as I think back to the day(s) leading up to Reese's birth. I haven't really journaled about it. There are many things I'd like to forget. It was the hardest thing I have ever done and words like, "We are never doing this again" and "Reese is going to be an only child" just might have come out of my mouth. At the same time, as hard as it was, I love to look at all of the pictures surrounding her birth and think...that's when we met you! This was the day the Lord determined for us to learn who our daughter was and she finally was here and no longer an idea or curiosity. Many of you have seen these pictures from facebook but I wanted to post them here one more time. It was a precious, exciting, exhausting and emotional day to say the least! 

A walk during pre-labor...trying to get things going!

Waiting out contractions at the Birth Center

Matt brought us lunch and the people at Arby's
went a little overboard with the sauce. We had a good laugh!

She's finally here! 6lbs 13oz and 20 1/2 in long!

After working through about 37 hours of labor that just would not allow real progress for Reese to be born we decided to be moved to the hospital right across the street from the birth center to see what some medicine would do! Literally after 1 hour of being on the smallest dose of pitocin and an epidural to relax (well a little...I had a hotspot which instead of having complete relief moved all the pain of the contractions to my right side where I still felt it) she was born! I went from 5 cm to 10 cm in an hour and then pushed for 30 maybe 40 minutes. We praise the Lord for a very healthy, vaginal delivery. There was concern that because of how exhausted I was we could have faced a cesarean. We had so many people praying us through this event and seriously saw our God's hand at work in all the details. 

Getting acquainted with our daughter

My mom and Matt...the best birthing coaches there are!

Our first visitors...Papa and Marmee Mehringer

Daddy and his girl

Getting ready to go home

Hello there...

I have to admit this whole blogging thing is quite intimidating. I had no idea how much work goes into designing, writing and putting everything together. All the blogging friends I have make this look so easy! And yet...I've also stood by and wished for far too long that we had a blog just so that family could see what is going on in our lives and feel as though they are a part of it.

So here goes... enjoy the thoughts and ideas that run through my mind as I learn how to be a stay-at-home mom to Reese, a wife to my sweet husband of almost 4 years, a homemaker to our humble little apartment here in Cali and a daughter to the King!