First 2 weeks and Halloween

After we got home from the hospital time seemed to fly the next couple of weeks. We were fortunate enough to have my Mom stay with us the whole time and my Dad came the last 5 days which was wonderful. My Mom is a saint. She helped us so much with Drake...sooo much with Drake. She would take him on little outings everyday to get him out of the house, make him meals, get up with him in the early hours of the morning, played with him alot.... all the while cooking for us and cleaning my house and still getting cuddle time with Lydia! We are so grateful for everything she did!

One thing that kept Drake busy was his early Christmas present, a kitchen! He loves it. This particular day he wanted his apron and cowboy hat on while he cooked!

The key was was to keep Drake busy since he has a 5 minute attention span! So another activity was to paint his little pumpkin Grandma got him. This activity took just that, about 5 mins and he was done! It took longer to get everything set up!

Drake and Pop-Pop

Weeks before I had Lydia we told Drake that he could carve pumpkins for Halloween when Pop-Pop got to our house. EVERYDAY he he reminded us. So the day before Halloween we finally carved pumpkins.

Halloween was so fun this year with Drake because it was the first holiday he really "got". He loved all of the decorations and understood that he got to dress up and go trick or treating for candy! The kids looked so cute in their festive pj's!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

The week before Halloween Drake had a blast going to our church's Trunk or Treat and get his first taste of trick or treating. He was so excited to show Grandma and I all of his candy when he got home. He also went with Jordan to work for a little bit and went trick or treating again. He was having soo much fun at all of these activites. Yes, we have a ton of candy still at our house!

The morning of Halloween my parents took Drake to our city's Halloween festival at our local park. We have gone for the past 4 years and it is such a fun thing they put on. Just get there early because holy cow it gets crowded! But Drake had a blast!

And here comes the Triceratops!! It was finally time to go trick or treating (for real)! We have been talking about it all month long and Drake was so excited to go! It's always somewhat of a struggle to get him to take pictures but not on Halloween. He just kept posing and sitting still for us to take as many as we wanted. His costume was so adorable on him, I loved it and better yet so did he. He put it on everyday we had it.

Little Lydia was a cute ladybug. It was the first time Grandma and Pop-Pop spent Halloween with us so we were so excited!

Ready to go!

Jordan and my Dad took Drake around and they went for a long time! Drake came in dragging his bag saying "heavy" because all of the candy he got. He had so much fun going door to door.

And of course pouring his whole bag out to see what he got! Such a fun Halloween. It makes Jordan and I so excited for the upcoming holidays because Drake is finally old enough to really understand and get into them. We love our triceratops!

The next day my parents left back to Vegas. It was such a fun extended stay with my parents. It made for a hard goodbye. These are the times when it's really hard living so far away from family. But I am grateful for the time we do get together, it makes it all the more special.

They left on a Tuesday and Jordan had off the rest of the week to help me out which was wonderful. We had our first taste of parenting 2 kids alone. Jordan especially understood what I go through everyday with Drake. Drake isn't a bad kid by any means, he is just very active. Like I said before he has an attention span of 5 minutes and then he gets bored and when he gets bored he gets into mischief. So we always have at least one eye on Drake. :) Jordan was such a huge help and that week just gave me a new appreciation and reminder of why I love him so much. He loves us so much and shows it. It was a great week as a family. The next week came and he was off to work which left me with the 2 kiddos to myself. Well we survived! We got out at least once everyday, even if was going to the post office, my friend took Drake one day which was wonderful...Thank you Melinda!, and we just did it, we made it work. I went to bed (and still am) around 9pm because with the time change Drake likes waking up around 6:30 which is with in an hour of me going back to sleep after feeding Lydia. So my solution...Drake goes to bed now around 7pm and I go to bed around 9pm. I don't do well without sleep but again we are surviving!

Since Lydia has been born I feel my happiness level has risen. And I want to go as far to say that I am just as happy as I was when Maddie was alive. I don't want this to sound like I havent been happy the past 3 years because I have, but now it's just gone up a step if that makes any sense. I feel our family is that much more complete and I have joy in my heart being home.