Tree House!!!

This tree house was yet again another labor of love from Jordan! And sheer creativity and INSANE construction skills! When Jordan had this idea to build a tree house in the back yard I had NO IDEA it would be to this magnitude! The really crazy part is that he thought of this all by himself, lots of people who have seen it have asked if it was a package he bought... nope! Designed and constructed by builder man Jordan ;)

Jordan has said it was a project where he bit of more than he could chew. It took countless hours, and most of those hours were right after we had Marli. So he was helping me, working, and trying to finish the tree house!

Here are some pictures of the tree house project! Avery was Jordan's little helper, she spent lots of time out there with him while I was inside with Marli. He got her some little tools and she just loved being out there with Dad.

The Finished Product!

The amazing thing is the deals that he got on everything. The slides were off kijiji, Tube slide for $200 and the one underneath for $50. Most of the wood he got for free at this place pat Nisku. It was raw natural cedar and maple, so he even planed them down to show the nice wood grain and then stained it all! Pretty incredible!

Some new things

Sure... I'd love a new living room set! BUT, its not in the budget right now! Plus, we would like to use this in the future family room once we have the basement (and are not renting it anymore) so where would we put this furniture when we have a new set??? The couch we got when we got married, so almost 7 years strong! Green is still my favourite color... but this couch has its fair share of stains; despite multiple washings.

Jordan has a great idea... new slip covers from IKEA! And perfect timing, they just came out with a few new colors and fabrics for this couch!


So new brown slip cover... throw in a few toss cushions o the mix... ta da!!! Living room make over!

This was a fun little project! Before I left work on mat leave we were cleaning out the back room. This fun little gem was about to be tossed. It used to hold a perfume line we carried, it had a different back and a couple shelves to hold the perfume testers. DUH... didn't take a before, sorry! You think I would have learned back now!

Well I took the shelves out, wallpapered the back to match our wallpaper wall. We found this antique egg beater at a garage sale in our area. Jordan mounted it for me, and there ya go! Some art for the kitchen! haha. I just love it, simple too!

And this tea pot, 50% off at Tin Box (one of my favourite accessories stores.) Since I have dark on most of my walls, I love accessorizing in white. And how cute is a tea pot that is an elephant! So yes... for all the tea I drink... hehe!

Oh and one more little change, our Marli girl! Smiles and cooing and ooing, and just melting my heart everyday! Avery loves that shes interacting now, today while Marli was in her swing and Avery was swinging her, Avery would just die in giggles when Marli would smile or make funny faces!

We've learned Marli has some reflux issues, as well as some eczema that flares up. We have her on some reflux medicine from my doctor and I cut out diary (not the easiest thing I've learned) and got this great cream recommended by a friend who's daughter has bad eczema. Wow! She is like a different baby this week, her eczema cleared up a ton! She is so much happier, feeding good again, and just adorable!

Welcome Miss. Marli Anne

I made 2 because I was having too much fun with a couple digital scrapbooking sets I downloaded. And Kamry made it hard giving us so many great shots, it was hard to choose! Thanks again for the pics Kamry!

Our Family of 4... first 10 day report!

My sister Kamry (who has taken up photography as a hobby and is so talented at it) took some shots of our family and baby Marli a couple days ago. She did such a great job! Thanks again Kamry! Here are some of my favourite shots she took!

My sexy husband! I could talk the world of this guy right now! He has been so wonderful as a father of 2, and husband! Since he finished his CMA entrance exam course, he has been intensely working on this insanely engineered custom build tree house for the kids in the back yard! Pics to come!

Our Big girl! Good job Kamry actually getting a picture of Avery's natural smile, she often for pictures does this cheesy phony smile and squints her eyes!

Love this one, makes me heart melt!

I love the face Marli is making in this picture! She sometimes does this goofy cross eyed face that makes me laugh, this is pretty close to it!

Long toes! Just like her sister and Dad!

Avery and her Daddy, hmmm... wonder where Avery got her eyes???

Me and my Marli girl :)

I just love this little face! Her and Avery definitely look like sisters when I compare Avery's baby pictures. But there are some differences too. Avery's eyes bugged out more than Marli's, I think there nose is the same except Marli's is more Pizzey and like mine where it sticks up a bit. There mouths and chins are different, Marli has her Daddy's chin.

First 10 days at home with 2:

- Marli very sweet baby, has some fussy time in the nights where she cries bloody murder! But once she gets over that, her nights have not been too bad. Great eater, I took her to be weighed today and she was 7lbs 10oz. At birthday she was 7lbs 12oz, so they were quite happy with how she was doing.

- Avery is so gently and sweet to her sister. Marli was laying on a blanket in the living room and started fussin, and Avery went and started singing Primary songs to her and saying "Its okay Marli!" And then she got her books to show her! She has shown some jealousy towards me and Jordan about not being the only little girl anymore. There are lots of "look at me Mom" or "look at me Dad" going on! But I think that's to be expected and part of adjusting.

- #1 adjustment for me. Not the lack of sleep, not the recovery on my body (which has been remarkably good), but I had 3 solid years with just 1 kid. And the last year and a half it was just us and we would go out and do little outings every morning, especially when its nice out! Library, park, spray parks, west ed, swimming... etc! I loved that! Its hard for me to realize I need to stay in and slow down a little bit this first while, while Marli is adjusting to this world! We have been so go go go, I need to slow down and realize that until Marli is just a little older (even a couple months) this won't be happening everyday.

- I feel so blessed to have these 2 beautiful daughters of God in my hands! I just adore them both so much! We waited a little longer for Marli to come along because of the 2 miscarriages! For her to finally join out family is such a blessing! I can't wait to watch her learn and grow and for Avery to have a little sisters to play with!

So why no post through July???

Go to dinner and Seinfeld with the family for Paiges Bday!

We dig holes with Dad for a very fun backyard project! Pics to come!

We went to the Jurassic Park Dinosaur Park with our friend Dmitri, so much fun!

Take the bus downtown to watch the Capital X parade... little bit of a disappointment, but Avery loved her first parade!

And since it ran right in front of Jordan's work he was able to join us, Avery was happy about that!

We got Avery's hair cut by Paige at her school!

And so much more! I wish I didn't forget my camera so much! We went to countless spray parks and parks, enjoyed Fort Edmonton one day, leg grounds, lots of playing in our little pool!

Oh and getting ready for little Marli to arrive! She did come a week early and the "to do" list that I had to get done before baby was just about complete. Just a couple things left that really weren't that important but crazy me thought they were! Its funny how you learn that those little things don't matter so much! Its been a good summer despite not the best weather!

Ready or not... here she comes!

Welcoming Marli Anne Heavenor! She caught us a little off guard... also it is funny how with the first baby every little small contraction or feeling you think is going into labor. With the second as the labor progressed it was like I was still in denial! And all that kept going through my head was how I wanted just one more day to finish my laundry, get some groceries, make up the babies bed because just that day Jordan had just barley raised the crib up!

This little monkey just could not wait. I was 39 weeks. That night at my parents for Sunday dinner I had a contraction that I thought "wow, that was a bit more than a braxton hicks!" I had been getting braxton hicks with this pregnancy pretty much since 28 weeks. So I did have the worry that I wouldn't know the difference when the real contractions would come... well... I knew!

I should say I know some of you probably don't want to hear the whole delivery story, but for those family and close friends that do want to hear this story here it is!

At about 1am Monday morning I woke up with my first more painful contraction. I was able to go back to sleep and then woke up with another at 2am and then another at 4am. At 4 I started having contractions every 20 minutes. That is when reality started to set in that maybe this kid was coming today! Even still I kept thinking it was false labor and that everything would pass and we would still go on with our holiday Monday plans, haha! I would get my laundry done, make up the babies bed, go to the leg with my sisters and Mom! And Jordan would get his day to work on the tree house (Jordans current project, its quite the tree house! Pics to come!)

At 5:30 they were starting to get quite painful, still about 20 mins apart. The night before I had said to Jordan that I bet there was a i-phone app for monitoring contractions! He thought that was a great idea and had found an awesome one that timed them and even put it in a graph! So thankfully he got that the night before!

Jordan got up at 5:30 to go to the wash room, and I decided I should probably tell him I'd been having pretty regular contractions. He was just as surprised as me, and we pull out the i-phone and started timing things. At 5:30 they started coming every 10 min, and getting quite painful. I had one at 6 that killed me! Jordan goes "okay, I guess I should get a bag together hey?!" We phoned my mom at 6:30 and told her what was going on. They started coming every 5 mins then, and we both still did not believe how quickly my body was going into labor. I think we just really didn't want to get to the hospital and get sent home!

My mom got to our house at 7 and right when she walked in I had a really bad contraction where I had to run to the sink to throw up! They were about 2 mins apart now... but sill we were questioning if we should go in! Thankfully my Mom said if it was hurting that much and that frequently we should go! As we were leaving we still said to my Mom we were sorry if we get sent home and we see her soon!

So we get to the hospital and because of the holiday Monday the admitting place is closed, so they just put us right into a delivery room to check me. We got to the hospital about 7:30, and was hooked up to the heart monitoring to monitor babies heart and my contractions for about 20 mins. After that she check if I was dilated and I was 5cm! I said to our nurse, "so I guess were not going home!?" Nope! She asked if I had any delivery plans, I said "epidural please!" She went and admitted us and told the doctor to get my epidural going.

In between being admitted at just after 8, and the anesthesiologist coming in at 8:45ish the contractions were getting so painful! I was totally feeling that feeling that I could not do this anymore and it was too painful! I had one very painful contraction and working through that my water broke! The nurse came in a confirmed that it did indeed! At 9 once the epidural started working (thank goodness) the nurse checked me and yup, I was fully dilated!

She said we would sit me up and soon we would start pushing. I was still able to feel when to push even with the epidural which was nice. We started pushing at 9:55, and I had still not seen the doctor yet. But we did have 2 very capable nurses and really until things progressed we didn't know how long we would be pushing for. After about 20 minutes of pushing, the head was there and not going back. The nurse asked me to stop pushing, and frantically paged Dr. Mar and the other nurse and tried to get the end of the bed off. They came running in the room and could not believe I was at the point I was. I barley had to push the rest of the way, and 10 mins later Marli was born!

Marli Anne Heavenor

7 lbs 12oz

Aug. 1

10:37am

It was so exciting when my Mom brought Avery by to meet her little sister. She was so sweet holding her sister and being so gentle! I just loved watching out girls together! Me and Jordan keep saying how funny it is to say "kids" and "girls"!

Love this pictures above, Avery just looks so happy to be a big sister!

Our family of 4! Of course you can't even see Marli's face and Avery wouldn't look at the camera, but thats okay!

Little peanut in her bed, she looks so tiny!

Funny story about the matching nighties. Avery got this nighty and it came with a matching nighty for her doll. The first night home with Marli Avery ran in the room before she went to bed and wanted us to put the nighty of Marli! I thought it was so cute she thought of that! It was way to small for Marli, but we made it work to get a picture of the 2 of them!

Happy to be home with our girls! Im not going to determine what kind of baby Marli is by the first couple days! I know babies sleep alot in the first couple days, but so far she is a very easy going baby that is very easy to settle and keep content. We just adore her and feel so blessed and grateful to have her in our family!