Crazy times

Okay there are so many things I keep meaning to post on but things have been going from bad to worse in our house, I'll explain all that later.

We can't believe that our tiny wee baby is getting bigger already ready. She is just over a month old and we are amazed at how heavy she feels. When she was last weighed almost 2 weeks ago she was up to 7lbs 9oz, we hope to have her weighed on Friday when the Health Visitor (HV) comes back out. She spends a little time most days looking around and has extremely developed neck muscles, holding her head up reasonably steady so she can see what is going on. She seems very inquisitive. However, now for the trouble - since she was born she has always spat up milk very frequently. It was thought that it was probably because she was taking to much milk from the breast or taking it too fast. From the start of last week she was getting progressively more unsettled. On Wednesday and Thursday she basically never slept all day and would scream for hours (that terrible high pitched scream that you know means they are sore somewhere, we put it down to colic. The HV came out on Friday and after hearing what was going on diagnosed reflux, which means that the muscles at the op of her stomach are not constricting tight enough and her milk and stomach acid keep coming up her throat. As anyone who has vomited in their life knows, that burns! Which means that she has been in pain for weeks, worsening as the inflammation in her throat has gotten more severe. That was the hardest part for me, knowing that she has been in pain and worse yet knowing there was nothing I could or did do. She ordered a prescription for something called Carobel (a thickening agent) which was to be added to her milk and given before her feeds. Our HV said that it might help and we might see improvement immediately or it might take up to 48 hours depending how severe the inflammation is. We started her on the Carobel that evening. It is very difficult since I am having to express milk everytime I feed her so that we have some to mix it up with. It also means that instead of taking 20 minutes to feed AJ it takes almost a hour. We have persevered and on Sunday evening we began to notice improvement. She is still unsettled at times and is still being sick but it is not as bad when it does happen.

Abby is doing pretty well considering that her world has just been turned upside down. She seems extremely tired despite sleeping 12 hours a night and taking a 2 hour nap. We think that she is having disturbed sleep (due to crying baby) and we are not getting out and about like we used to so she is probably getting lethargic from inactivity. She is really sweet with her sister and today tried to share a ball with her. She seems excited to have join in what she is doing.

More news another time. Here are some pictures.

Quick photo shoot

We decided to take some family shots and here is what we got. Not professional or arty but some nice ones.

I wish I could remember what she was saying to me. I feel this is a glimpse into teenage years!



Sweet pic with the proud grandparents

Sisters, sisters, never were there such devoted sisters!




First bath at home.

Abby's 2nd Birthday

I know it is late but as those of you with new baby's know it is hard to get the time. So I will post Abby's birthday as if it had just happened, ignoring the fact that is was a week or so ago.

Our Abby turned two! We can't believe it has been 2 years since we welcomed Abigail Faith into the world. She is the reason we began our blog and the very first post was to share her birth story. It is amazing to see how much she has changed and grown over the last 2 years.

Here she was just a few hours old..

Our beautiful girl on her first birthday last year

Our grown up 2 year old

We didn't really get to celebrate her first birthday so we wanted to do something small but special for her second birthday. We decided to have an early afternoon party and invited Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Cousins and a few friends. There were 11 Adults (Grannie, Grandad, Pappy, Uncle JA, Aunt Kristen, Russell, Rachael, Grandpa Michael, Grandma Maureen and of course Mama and Dada) and 6 children (Brennan, Johnathan, Lewis, Libby, Abby and Anna Jane). We had the best weather that we could have hoped for, it was sunny and warm with not much wind. I suppose we should start at the beginning of the day. We went in together to get her up and wish her a happy birthday, she was very excited. We had blown up several balloons for her birthday and when she came down stairs she ran into the livngroom to see her happy birthday balloons. After playing with them for a few minutes she had breakfast and got into her party dress. Since we planned on having the kids play in the garden we had her unveil some of her birthday presents (they were outside toys) before everyone arrived.











Once she had welcomed her guests we got her changed into play clothes filled her brand new sand/water table and let all the kids out into the garden. They all had a blast playing with the water table, see saw, trampoline, and ride on toy. It was such a nice day that they had their birthday lunch as a birthday picnic lunch. Of course there was birthday cake to follow and though the party was supposed to end at 1pm it was between 2 and 3 pm when most people left. After Abby's nap she opened a few more presents to end the day.



Abby and Lewis at the water table


Brennan and Jonathan on the ride on motorbike


Jonathan at the water table


Big boy fun (Brennan, Lewis and Russell)


Cousins enjoying the water

A bracelet from Pappy




Gift from Uncle JA, Kristen, Brennan and Jonathan. She plays with it all the time and loves it.

It was a great day, everyone seemed to enjoy it and it went as well as toddlers parties can go. Anna Jane was very well behaved and just ate and slept allowing her sister to be the center of attention on her big day.

We hope all our future parties go so well.

New Arrival!!!!

Hi everyone. It's that time again; that once every blue moon event when I write a post instead of Deborah! A very quick announcement for everyone. We became parents again in the early hours of June 21st 2009. We have been blessed with another little girl; Anna Jane Grace Chapman was born at 2:51am in the Cottage Hospital in Peterhead. Her birth weight was 6lb 10oz, and mother and baby are doing great. Just to clarify, though we are not hyphenating, her first name is "Anna Jane", so Jane is not a middle name.

Deborah's waters broke at 1:30am, just as we were about to retire after an evening of painting in the nursery (hence, this was the only night all week that we were NOT prepared for going to the hospital) so I guess that made for a 1 hour 20 minute labour. While this was even shorter than when Abigail was born, we live 5 minutes from the hospital, so we had plenty of time to get there after "Auntie Rachel" Gaunt came to babysit the fast-asleep Abigail. Deborah's Mum is here and her Dad will travel up tomorrow, so I will likely finish out the last two weeks of work before the summer holidays and will then take my two weeks paternity leave in August as originally planned. Deborah is tired but doing a fantastic job as always, and is planning to come home tomorrow afternoon. We covet your prayers as we begin another chapter in our life as a family, praying especially that Anna Jane will grow in strength, stature and eventually faith.

And now the part you've all been waiting for.... pictures!

Anna Jane Grace Chapman: about 40 minutes old

As I discovered last time: babies come with hats!!

(West Wing fans chuckle!)

The new line-up for the Chapman Family!

Abigail, painting Anna Jane's room, blissfully unaware of what she would awaken to the next morning!!

P.S. Before anyone says it, Dad is already aware of the awful fact; two weddings!

Summer day Video's

Here are some of the clips that we took.







She had already fallen on her butt earlier.







That will have to be all for now as I am exhausted. I will do a few more pictures later.

Great summer day

We had the best day ever! David was off school Monday and better yet the weather was set to be hot and Sunny. We arranged to meet up with JA, Kristen, Brennan and Jonathan at Cruden Bay beach late morning. The kids seemed a bit reluctant to take their shoes off at first but once they saw that we were doing it and getting to paddle and splash in the water they both couldn't wait to get their shoes off and join in. Though the water was cold it was impossible to get them out. Abby was running into the waves and then back out and in again, at one point we had to stop her from running in above her waist! Of course the inevitable happened when she ran in lost her balance and sat down in the water, she laughed and was ready to go again. Later she was running in and fell forwards onto her hands and knees. So she was well and truly soaked! I could not believe that I did not think to take a change of clothes - thankfully the beach is only 15 minutes drive from our house. We also saw a starfish in the water which was really cool. We ended up staying longer than we planned and after a quick stop by the house to get dried and changed we all went to McDonalds for lunch. Our plan then was to head to Aiden Park and again, though the kids were tired they enjoyed playing on swings, slides and see saws. Again we were reluctant to leave but eventually headed for home. We had thought about having a BBQ but it was so late in the day that we just grabbed a quick bite and had to say goodbye as bedtimes loomed. Here are just a few of the pictures and I will post the videos in another post so that I can get these on now and not have to wait on video.

The Beach















The Park











Trying to get a cute cousins in the daisy's picture



I think this one is about the best





This one cracked me up, their expressions are great!



On the way home, what a day!