Kayla Elizabeth Burke

 

Kayla was born on March 19th at 12:03 am.  She weighed 8 pounds and 12 ounces and was 20 1/2 inches long.  We had a scheduled C-Section planned for March 21st but on Monday the 18th I started to have really strong contractions about 7pm.  As the night went on they kept getting stronger and closer together so about 9:45 we decided to head down to the hospital.  Once I was all set up in the room they examined me and determined I was dilated to a 5 and fully effaced.  So they said it was time for the C-Section.  So they quickly got me ready and we headed to the surgery room around 11pm.  March 18th is my Brother's Birthday so I was really hoping that she would be delivered before midnight.  But due to some complications she didn't arrive till 12:03.  She is a really good baby and loves to snuggle.  When the kids came to the hospital they were so excited to see her. We stayed in the hospital till Thursday afternoon.  I am very thankful for my Mom and Sisters who took such great care of my kids while Dan and I were in the hospital.  Since we have been home we all have adjusted really well, except that Miss Kayla loves to sleep with Mom and Dad so getting longer than 2 hours of sleep at a time has been hard.  So other than being completely sleep deprived we are all doing great! 

 

 

 

When she was born she had really long nails and since she loves to have her hands next to her face she scratched herself a couple of times.  The mark on her left cheek was the worse.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My Father

                        

My Father passed away on February 16th.  He had gone into the hospital on Feb. 14th and was expected to come home on the 17th.  While in the hospital he had some internal bleeding but his blood was to thin so they couldn't open him up without the risk of him bleeding to death.  So all of us children that live close were able to go to the hospital and say our goodbyes before he passed away.  Losing him has been really hard on our whole family.  His Funeral and Burial were very beautiful and I feel both my Brothers did such an incredible job honoring him.  Many friends and family came to pay their respects which was so wonderful.  Every day I miss him but I know he is in a better place and that he is no longer suffering.  I am so thankful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the knowledge that I know I will see him again and like Our Savior he will live again.  My Father was an amazing man and I feel very privileged that I was able to care for him during he his last few years.  I also want to express my Love for my Husband because he was so incredible and helpful to my Dad.  Living with your in laws can be hard but my Husband did it because he knew they needed us and he did it without complaint. 

 

We had his funeral on Wednesday Feb. 20th with a little luncheon afterwards.  My Brother Cris gave a beautiful Eulogy and then my Brother John gave an amazing talk on the Atonement and Resurrection.  Also the Grandchildren all sang I am a Child of God which was so incredible and something I think my Father would have been very proud of.  We didn't bury him until Feb. 27th because my Sister Anna was having surgery on Feb. 21st and we wanted to give her time to recover before the burial.  My Brother Cris and his family were able to fly in from Texas for the week of the funeral but unfortunately only he was able to attend the burial so that was hard not having the rest of his family here for it.  A few things I want to remember about that week were one the out pour of love and support from family and friends.  The second was how nice it was to be with family and be able to remember my Father and laugh about good times.  The last thing I want to make sure to remember was how so many people said that on the Evening before he passed they had random thoughts about it.  Sort of like my Father was saying goodbye to those he loved but didn't get to see very often.  My Father is buried at Riverside National Cemetery where he received a veteran's burial that included a 21 gun salute.  After the shots were done the men picked up the shell casings and gave them to each of the grandchildren which was really special.  I am so thankful for my Family and I love them so very much. 

 

We made this board full of pictures to display at the luncheon

it turned out really great

 

                                   
   

Our Last Trip

As a family of 5!  Since we only have 6 weeks left until we become a family of 6 we decided it was a perfect time to take a quick trip.  This past weekend we took the boys out of school on Friday and headed to Vegas.  We stayed in our time share and had a great time hanging out and being together.  My Brother John and his family joined us which was fun and their room was right across the hall from us which the kids all loved.  While we were there we did a fun scavenger hunt on the strip, we saw the Las Vegas Temple, we saw my Uncle and Aunt and we went to the Hoover Dam.  We also went swimming and played lots of games in our room.  It was a really nice, quick trip.

Fun on the Strip

Las Vegas Temple

Hoover Dam

The Bridge across from the Dam

Christian was very excited that we crossed into Arizona since that is where he was born!

The Bridge was built in 2010 across from the Dam and the view was amazing!

Halloween Fun

In order to try and stay a little more current I am going to blog about Halloween and then I will blog about September and other fun things later on.

I have decided that our family really loves holidays. We love to decorate the house and do all the fun holiday stuff and this Halloween was no different. Our Halloween fun started when I took the little ones to Disneyland at the beginning of October. It was a really perfect day not to crowded and the kids and I had a blast.Our next fun activity was Grandma's Office Halloween party. We love getting to go and have pizza and do a little office trick or treating. This year Ryan dressed up at Darth Mal from Star Wars, Christian was a Clone trooper from Star Wars and Megan was Dorthy from the Wizard of Oz. It was the first year we didn't have the kids dress similarly and I think it will most likely be like that for a while since they all have such strong opinions of what they want to be. :)

Ryan getting his makeup and hair done for his costume. 10 out of 13 grand kids with GrandmaThe night after the Office party we had a party at our place. We had some people from church come over and we decorated pumpkins, had dinner and decorated cookies. We weren't sure how many people were going to show up but we ended up having 20 kids and 20 adults. It was a big group but we all had a blast.Megan started carving her pumpkin but once she realized how gross it was to touch she quickly moved on to other things.Dan's lego pumpkinChristian's guts pumpkinMegan took the lid off the sprinkles and dumped them all on her cookie. You can't tell by her face but she did really love it and ended up eating almost all of them off her plate.Then on Halloween night we had the Gibson family come up and join us for dinner and trick or treating. This year the kids were the perfect ages for trick or treating. They all had so much fun. When Dan got off work he joined us for the last couple of houses. There were a few houses that had decorated their garages to be a Halloween maze so luckily Dan was there to take the kids through because that is not my thing!