Days of Firsts

Orion started going to his Portugese Preschool today. He'll be going 5 days a week from 9am-noon. We have noticed that since the baby came home he's been really boared, getting into things and just going stir crazy since Kylor is not there for him to play with. He was so excited to start school. He seemed to have a good time playing with the kids, alot of the kids speak english and also the teachers do too, so if he needs help they will speak english to him.

Quinn had his first bath at home today, it's been a few days late, just trying to find the right time to do it. It's been none stop here. He is so much fun and still he's the best baby ever I must say.

After we had family home evening of singing songs and playing candyland, Steve took some pictures of the boys together in their P.Js.

Holding hands with an Angel

Moses Basket

We had this made by the basketman in biscoits here. It's so neat. I've never had a bassinett before this. The fabric was chosen then taken to a seamstress in Praia to make it. It's convient to have I can more him from room to room if I want.

Hi!

Wow! a whirlwind of events these past few days, Audrey got home Thurday and seems like it's been none stop here at our home. We having been getting paper work done for the social security info, passport & birth cert. also trying to adjust to the changes in our home. Thursday Steve, Aud & Quinn went out to lunch with a friend.

Friday-Audrey picked up the Bassinett that we had the linens made for inside. I think I posted about that earlier this month. We went last week and picked out the fabric and dropped it off to be made, it turned out perfect.

We have been taking alot of pictures of the baby if you can't tell. Tonight we went to our Wards trunk or treat activity and that was fun for the kids.

We have had so many people call and come over and offer there help, we really have a close knit community here. The day Audrey came home from the hospital, Saraup, a good friend cleaned our home, and got Quinn's room all situated for us it was so great! The word of the baby being born traveled so fast. We have a great support group here with the family like friends, who are the best!

We recieved the 7 packages today (shower by mail) sent from family back in Utah. Thank you so much for everything we love it!!!!!

Just want to say how blessed and loved we feel by having such a beautiful new baby in our family. Quinn is so perfect. It's so neat to see Kylor and Orion with him. I never knew how complete I would feel with having 3 boys, now that he's here, I can't imagine our family without him. He's brought so much Joy to our family in just the 4 short days he's been with us.

(We are already thinking of a possibility for a 4th child in maybe in a few years, but that for sure would be our last if we decided to have another one.)

Baby Quinn

Here are the first pictures of Baby Quinn.

Quinton Alexander Merkley

Born October 23, 2007

5:02pm, Angra Do Heroismo Hospital

9 lbs 13 oz, 21 inches

The boys are so excited to have a new baby brother. Quinn is such a perfect baby, he doesn't cry much and only then it's more like a queek. We think he looks like, Steve when he was born from the pictures we have seen. The labor went well, complication & drug free, about 4 1/2 hrs, it was an induction due to low heart tones. Mom and Baby both doing good, it's a relief it's all over. Due to his weight I think it's obvious he was over cooked..heheh! (yeah the 17th my due date according to my cycle) I never thought I could have a near 10 lb baby. Never the less he's healthy and all is well. It's so nice to be home and all together as a family again. I will post more pictures later...The view, is the view from my hospital window. The hospital was great they were so nice, I left the Maturnity ward with about 5 friends, since we I got admitted I had 2 room mates and they were locals who spoke english, from other islands who came to have help in their pregancies, the portugese I know came in handy, many nurses didnt speak English, food was good. I got Coffee and a roll for breakfast so I'm glad I packed some Nutra grain bars in bag. There are many details to the story, but I'm keeping it short.

Labor pains

Saturday, I had labor pains on and off, just pretty much took it easy. This morning wolk up feeling pretty crampy, as of now I'm still cramping, contrations 5 mins apart now for about 2 hrs...let hope it's today....

Later this afternoon.
update: Later this afternoon we went to the Hosptial, contractions 3-5 minutes apart and having alot of pink coming out, the L&D checked me, I was having some good contractions but was not dialated enough about 2-3 cm, they sent me home. The boys are with the McCool Family for the night.

What makes us laugh...

Here is something funny we all enjoy watching.

Halloween Costumes 2007

Here are the boys in their Halloween costumes. Ky is The Avatar-Aang from the TV series, Orion is a Lion like last year,they love dressing up. We wanted to get pictures of them since we are not sure what things are going to be like here on Halloween, I may be in the Hospital at that time who knows??...also the base housing area has a stampeed of Portugese Adults and teens, Children on Halloween night here all expecting candy..We are not going to participate in giving candy out at home, due to safetly reasons...Alot of people have been spit on when they have not had enough candy and cars have been keyed in the process, alot of scarey things, which is kinda sad and makes the Holiday a bit difficult. We instead are going to do things before Halloween like school, church and base activties to make it still feel like Halloween time. Happy Halloween to everyone!!!!

what's going on??????

Today was my Dr appointment. All I can say is I'm finding myself quite frustrated about this whole pregnancy thing. He checked me and the plan was to have him strip my membranes today, we'll he told me that my cervix was not ready and that he can't do it right now. I find it hard to think that I'm not even dialating, being one week away from actual due date, and this is my 3rd child....this is crazy!!! It's quite depressing and I feel like I will be pregnant forever.
I'm becoming concerned about the size of this baby still growing inside of me, we went to the base clinic and asked the Ultrasound tech guy to do me a favor and check to see how big this baby is, I'm scared he's not going to fit. We'll the measurements he got were 39 wks and 40 wks 5 dys on another and other ones just said ?????wks which means the machine is old and couldnt go beyond 41 or 42 wks....yeah estimated weight near 9-10 lbs, though it's had to get an acurate reading now, Oh how I miss the states medical care..especially if I have to get induced or worse a c-section....oh well, what else can I do about it...really nothing--- I will let you all know when my heavenly day comes...until then I don't really have anything good to say.
Steve had today off. It's so nice when he's home to help me out, Orion wolk up cranky and we gave him a nap in the afternoon. Kylor loves playing with the McCool Boys, a family that has 4 boys after school sometimes he plays at their home or at the playground by our house.

This is funny

Gummy Bear - English

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Friends Farm

Hey, I just have to share this with everyone. We have some american friends in our branch that live off base and they have all kinda of animals. It's acutally our Branch President's family. We had the chance to go to their home today for take a peek at the cute piggy's.Their Pig had 13 babies 5 weeks ago. They are so cute. Orion was all about touching the animals, Ky just looked and his favorite part was the baby pigs. We had another beautiful sunny day here, its just perfect right now.

Algar do Carvao, hike

Today we had a perfect day for being outside, this is rare these days, we knew we had to take full advantage of it. We decided to take the kids on the hike above the Caves, you can hike down into the cave too, we did that back in January...We'll the kids we found are great hikers...I was little slow, I wonder why? It was a good way to get my contractions started though...We had a good time. Kylor liked being the Hiking leader they are both pretty quick, I can't wait until we have all three boys with us, it's going to be more fun then for me especially, Maybe I'm in my last high energy week, which may mean soon he'll be here.

Update...

Baby Stress test, everything is fine with baby...no signs of stress. Steve came..but he was not able to be with me while doing the stress test. He was bothered that he had to wait so long when they told him is would only be about 20 mins, it ended out being 1 hr and a half...plus he says it was weird not being able to be with me, he's always been able to be there with the other two. This appointment was upstairs in the hospital in the Maturnity Ward...Here they have a policy that if another woman is in the room (all rooms here are shared) then the man has to be outside. (Yes they are very old school) Even the Labor rooms are shared so this is a concern to us...All my friends that I have talked to have had their husbands in the room with them, so we are just hoping nobody else is in the room while I'm in labor...I dread going out and about lately, this island is so small and everyone comments on how pregnant I am to me ...it's nice of them, but I'm tired of the questions on when it's going to happen????? It's usually right when I don't feel good too, like when I have to go to Kylor from school, that's the worst part of the day for me...
Steve is getting a B in his Speech Class, he turned in his last homework and did his last speech today ...it was a "Persuasive speech" today in class...his choice topic was -"Are Mormons Christians?" after he was done they just asked questions about the church... no one openly argued the point & He did a good job. It's just been a Hot Topic in the news lately...
Steve has been on a cooking kick, he finds ingredients and just throw something together, he's made, chicken fried rice, pizza, cookies,soft taco's, I don't even ask him to cook he just knows I dont want too, for obvious reasons... Kylor had 3 serving of the rice tonight....His Pizza the kids love too.. I'm not too keen on food much at all lately..but I know everything I have tasted it's been good, one sign it's great!!! The kids love it! What a nice Daddy cooking us dinner. Thanks Honey!

Soccer Season Over

Today was Ky's last soccer game of the season, he sure enjoyed playing...They gave out necklace trophies, and shirts and certificates to the kids. Following that we had a Bowling party and potluck with the team and families. Since I had the honor of being the Soccer Team Mom, I basically organized the end of season party, everyone seemed to have a good time. Kylor and Orion & Steve bowled, they were so excited, bowling is not something we do very often. It's so nice to see Kylor be so proud of himself.

***Steve's work award was the "Sharp Airman Award", just for doing a good job at work, he got a certificate for it***His Speech class ends on Friday Oct 12th!!! YAY, he's so ready for it to be over with, He's done pretty good. Especially since he never broke down and bought the book for the class, saved us 80 bucko's....the teacher is pretty hard on his grading too, so It will be nice just to have it over with & to have that credit filled.

Audrey, We'll Dr. Visit on Thursday went well, I'm basically just another patient, they don't really tell you anything as far as process on the pregnancy goes, He did a cervical exam and told me, the baby is not ready yet. I miss being told what's going on with my body, I know it doesn't really change anything, but atleast with the other two, I knew what my body was doing...all I feel now is alot of pressure and pains, I'm not even sure if I'm dialated yet...Tuesday the Dr. is doing a Stress Test for the baby up in the Maturnity ward that should be interesting...

Coming next year: The Rotater flights, the plane that takes us to the states and europe. We'll the schedule has changed and now it fly's to Naples, Italy & Crete the island of Greece....We are planning to hit both places probably next spring...we would really kick ourselves if we don't go, Crete is beautiful we hear and it's a perfect vacation spot year round. So thats something to look forward too.

** It's conference weekend, and we've been home, we could have gone to the Family Support Center with the branch to watch it, but we chose to stay home, we'll probably go tommarrow to hear what we can***

Orion & Portugese Preschool

I forgot to write about this, I went and got Orion approved in Praia to go to the Lajes base portuguese preschool...we think it will be good for him to go. I need to go fill out more papers before he actually starts but I may wait until I have the baby, due to how I've been feeling lately. The pre-school is where alot of Portugese Military families take their kids he'd be in a class ages 3-5 yrs old. They dont start elementary school here until 6 or 7 I think... We'll start Orion on Mon-Wed-Friday from 9-noon, then maybe later we'll do everyday...I'll keep you updated on this

Tuesday

Hello, Yesterday was a full day...I had to go to the clinic and have my Group-B done again, I guess the lab messed up on the swab or something and they could not accept it. Yeah so that was fun. I asked my Base. Dr. to check on how sure they are the 26th is my due date, since I've been having alot of signs that labor will be soon. She said they are going off my ultrasound measurements, on an ultrasounds when I was 8 weeks...In my mind I still believe I should be due 17th of October which means I'm 38 weeks now. I say that because of the cycle date. The base clinic here I've not been too impressed with. It's like having a baby back in 1980 again...I miss the care I got with Kylor and Orion. Either way I guess it doesn't matter now. I need to ask my Angra Dr. Ticheda which date he's going by. I see him on Tommarrow. I'm so ready now. It's hard to even get comfortable now.
Kylor had a full day too...He got bit by a kid at school on the playground, I guess he took matters into his own hands and went and told that kid "You should not bite me" another student went and told the teacher what happened. They put ice on it, thankfully it didnt break the skin. This same child has fought with Kylor in his class room a week or so ago, the teachers moved Kylor to a new table, from red to blue table,cause they were fighting, from the what teachers have observed, it's this other boy that's been causing the problems...That's also what Kylor has told me...I found out yesterday this boy is moving this week so that maybe why he's having behavior issues...Poor Kylor...He told me all about it once I picked him up. The teacher was so good in explaing the situation to me too. Kylor told Ms. Rhonda that "If Gavin bites me one more time I'm not going to be his friend, the teacher said, if that ever happens you need to come and tell us Kylor"...Kylor seems to not be taking it hard...I just told him to stay away from this boy so he doesn't get hurt...
Then, I had my Party lite candle party last night...I had a great turn out. It's so nice to have friends over to just talk too and have a good time with..I think I had about 10 people here. Our house smelt so good with the candles burning too. That was yesterday...Today is much less busy....Enjoy!