A Charlie Brown Christmas

Not only did we have a real "Charlie Brown Christmas Tree," but we focused on the true meaning of Christmas. This year Jamie was actually excited about Christmas, it was time to start our own family traditions. Although Aviella probably won't remember this Christmas as she gets older, she was old enough to be excited about the Christmas tree and other traditions that we started.


Our first tradition was to incorporate St. Nicholas Day (a fairly German holiday - prevalent in WI, but not many other states). On December 5th we picked out our Christmas tree and Ryan set it up in the house. Aviella seemed to enjoy picking out the tree (leary of the snow on the ground at first; she didn't want to walk on it) - there were doggies and reindeer at the place we got our tree. Our tree was not a farmed tree, but rather an "environmentally friendly" Charlie Brown tree that was removed from the National Forest to aid in preventing forest fires. Anyway, that night we decorated the tree and the house for Christmas. When Aviella woke up on St. Nicholas Day, not only did she have a stocking with some presents, but the house was filled with the spirit of Christmas. She was in awe of the tree and snowflakes hanging in the hallway.

Our next tradition was to make our version of the Advent Wreath and light the candles on Sunday evenings before dinner. We also started a tradition to give our kids three gifts from us for Christmas representing what Jesus received from the three Wise men; one gift being educational, one practical, and one fun. We also purchased (and received) some books on the true meaning of Christmas and who the real St. Nicholas was which we plan to read during the Christmas season to our children as they grow up.

In addition to our tradition making, we had a fun-filled Christmas party for friends in our community here at Family Housing. Lots of laughs were had during the white elephant gift exchange, especially the "bedazzled" toilet seat!! We also enjoyed a "Christmas tea" and playtime with our British and South African neighbors who served mince pies and mulled wine (or grape juice for those of us pregnant/nursing). There were German, Japanese, Korean friends there too. For Christmas Eve we invited a Chinese couple that we are friends with to join us for church and dinner. It was a great time to share the true meaning of Christmas with them - prior to this year they thought that American Christmas was just about gifts and Santa (everything the children wanted)! After opening gifts on Christmas morning, relaxing for a bit and packing for our trip back to WI, we ate a Christmas dinner with some of our Korean friends. It was a very International Holiday for us this year; we had a wonderful time.

Our trip back to WI was enjoyable (aside from the two day drive) and extremely busy. We saw lots of family and friends and Aviella enjoyed all the doggies and horses she met as well as all the people. We were amazed at how well she did and how comfortable she seemed to be with our friends and family that she rarely gets to see (except in pictures). Unfortunately we did not make it up to LaCrosse, to visit Ryan's extended family as we had hoped, but maybe we will make it back for the Family Rendezvous in August. Ryan got sick while in WI and was somewhat miserable most of the time we were there. It was good to get home and sleep in our own beds.

We wish everyone a Happy New Year!

Facebook is to blame!

Sorry friends, we have joined the world of Facebook - or at least Jamie has which means that our blog has gone by the way side. Well, Facebook is only partially to blame. So, we will try to bring you up to speed on our lives.


Let's see, Jamie applied for a Resident Manager position and was accepted, but then turned it down. We decided that moving less than a year after we moved here (into an even smaller space) was not something we were interested in after all. So, plan B - Jamie gets elected onto Resident Council and gets a summer job as a nanny in Longmont (about 20 min from Boulder) for a six year old boy about 15 hours a week, and Aviella comes with her. Worked out well, but probably won't do that again. Now Jamie is babysitter/nanny for a neighbor and that is going swimmingly! The first two weeks were a bit rough, before Aviella was walking. She didn't really like Mommy holding another baby (Hunter is currently 9 months). Now the two enjoy playing together and always seem excited to see each other (at least the squeals and grabbing faces seems to mean excitement). Jamie is still leading an English conversation group and has also become involved in two Bible studies - one for international and American women and the other is a couple's study with some international families as well.

Ryan finished his first year of classes and then took a May-mester course (3 1/2 hour class everyday for three weeks of May plus homework, hence the name May-mester). During the summer he worked on a research project and neither of us really had time for a vacation. :( Ryan did, however, attend a conference at Berkeley and was able to spend a short period of time with his brother Anthony and family. We were all sad that Aviella and Jamie were not able to join them, but we are excited that Anthony, Sandi and the girls will be coming to Boulder for Thanksgiving! :) Ryan has since started his fall semester and been recommended for a fellowship, which funding is to begin mid-October - woo hoo!! Consequently, Ryan's schedule has gotten busier than he had anticipated. He had to add a math class for the fellowship, had already agreed to a contract job, takes his preliminary exam at the beginning of November and has a weekly and bi-weekly meeting with his advisors for thesis credits and fellowship stuff. Until the end of November he will continue to be a bit stressed, once he takes the prelims he has much catch-up work to do in the math course.

We received somewhat of a surprise visit from Ryan's sister Nicki and her husband Page, because of some last minute changes in plans due to Nicki's pregnancy. We enjoyed dinner and breakfast with them before they flew out of Denver. Unfortunately Ryan was in CA at his conference when they returned, but Jamie and Aviella were able to enjoy a picnic lunch with them before they headed back to CA via Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. We were all joyously shocked to learn that Nicki is pregnant with twins!! Sadly, Page will be in Iraq when the babies are born. Maybe he will be able to be present at the birth via satellite.

Aviella turned one in September and was walking at her first birthday. She took her first steps after we returned from our only summer vacation (the week before Ryan's classes began again). For awhile she was crawling more than walking, but now she is always walking and she is getting pretty good - although we think she kind of looks like a drunken sailor. Aviella's first birthday party was a hit! Grandpa Jim and Lulu came out for the occasion and we had lots of neighbors and friends around to help us celebrate this milestone. Aviella has a few words: mommy, daddy, baby/bobby, and doggie (sometimes sounds very similar to her word for daddy). She loves animals, especially dogs. When she sees them she squeals and shakes with sheer delight.


Oh, one more minor thing. We are glad that she has already learned the word for baby (although everything seems to be a "baby") since she will have a sibling in the very near future. That's right, we are expecting our second child - sometime at the end of April. Well, that should get us caught up to date. Now we need to update the Shutterfly account with recent pictures.

Speedy Recovery in WI

Recently Aviella and Jamie flew to WI to help Jamie's mom (Oma to Aviella) after her knee surgery. Oma had partial knee replacements in both knees!! Jamie helped with the cooking and horses - cleaning and preparing the stalls for evening. Aviella helped speed up Oma's recovery. When we arrived Oma was walking with a walker around the house, but by the time we left Oma was using a cane and walking down to the barn - she was even cleaning stalls (because Jamie got sick)!

Before Aviella and Jamie left Ryan for almost two weeks they made and hung up posters around the house letting Daddy know how much he was loved and would be missed while they were gone. They even made cards to send back periodically during the two weeks. Ryan was very appreciative of the posters and cards - he missed both Jamie and his little girl.

Aviella got to know her Oma and Opa quite well while in WI. She really enjoyed pulling on her Opa's mustache and reaching for his glasses. They even did tummy time together. Tucker and Tanner are Oma and Opa's dogs that Aviella was fascinated by; they made her laugh and she enjoyed touching their soft fur.

Jamie arranged a few play dates with friends and their children while in WI. Aviella got to meet lots of people and had fun playing with the other children. She loves to "talk" to other babies and children, it is so much fun to see and hear. Cousin Ryleigh and Auntie Marcy came for a weekend visit; Ryleigh is a little over a year and a half old. Once when Aviella woke up from her nap Ryleigh heard her crying through the monitor and picked it up to say hello to Aviella and let her know that "we're comin'." It was so cute, we all got a good laugh out of it. Grandma Hall also came over to spend some time with Aviella. Unfortunately Jamie got violently ill the night before her stamping party, so we did not see all the friends that we had hoped to see. Jamie was able to recover enough to celebrate Grandpa Jim's 60th birthday at Auntie Andrea and Uncle Shane's house before returning to Colorado.

While in WI Jamie also took care of some tasks related to the sale of our house, we close on the 27th of March. We give thanks and praise to God for this and thank all of you who have been praying.

You can see more pictures from our trip and the friends we visited (as well as the last six months of Aviella's life) at: www.aviellanadira.shutterfly.com.

Aviella got her first meal of baby rice cereal after we returned to Colorado. Daddy wanted to be a part of that experience and mommy didn't want to deal with making baby food while out of town. Aviella is now six months old, eating baby food and sitting on her own.

Wow, Time Flies!

Sorry it has been so long since we have updated our blog - I guess life kind of spun out of control for awhile there. Ryan's first semester was incredibly busy with three classes plus the TA position (and becoming a new father), so we thought he would try to slow down this semester and only take two classes along with the TA position, but apparently that wasn't enough for his schedule because an interesting research project came up that may lead to his dissertation topic. To simplify, it is a geothermal research project on an indian reservation in South Dakota (a place Jamie has actually heard of because YouthWorks! has a site there). Anyway, we will try to catch you up on what has happened in our lives since the beginning of October.

Let's see, Aviella had her first bath - she hated it! Due to the dry climate we waited nearly a month to give her a bath. She still hates baths, but some are worse than others. Aviella experienced her first Halloween and had a really cute "Pink Panther" costume thanks to Ryan's Dad and Mary Lou.

In November we did some traveling with Aviella. She had her first plane ride and first long car trip. Ryan's sister Nicki got married in Orange County, CA the weekend before Thanksgiving. Aviella did wonderfully on the plane and we enjoyed seeing family. Nicki was a beautiful bride!! For Thanksgiving we visited Jamie's friend Amanda and her husband Christian's family in the SW part of Colorado - should be a six hour drive, but turned into an eight hour drive due to traffic and snow, as well as crazy mountain passes. Before the trip, Amanda told Jamie that it was possible to safely nurse while in the car with your seatbelt on and we discovered that this was true. It saved us some time and frustration. Aviella wasn't very interested in taking the bottles that Jamie had prepared for her (and worked hard to produce). Thankfully the trip home was exactly six hours, including stops and Aviella slept most of the way.

December was fairly busy. Jamie organized and facilitated a Tea/Brunch for International Women through the ministry that she is involved (Horizons). Despite a very snowy day we were happy with the turn out. Ryan was busy finishing up projects for his classes - he wasn't home much. December also brought us an extremely long car trip back to WI for the holidays. Somewhat of a nightmare, at least for Ryan and Jamie; Aviella seemed to do just fine, but she was extremely tired of her car seat by the end of the drive. What others told us takes about 16 hours took us 21. We were tempted to spend the night somewhere, but by then the weather was deteriorating and was expected to be worse the next day. Arriving at Jamie's parents' house around 4am after 8 hours of driving through fog at night started the trip off poorly, not sure if we caught up on our lack of sleep until we returned to CO. We enjoyed our time in WI seeing family and friends, but cut our trip a bit short for Aviella's sake as she was getting sick and lost her voice. If you have never heard a baby cry that has lost its voice, it is really sad!

Hmmm, January was actually somewhat low key. We reorganized the living room and storage unit (actually this happens nearly every time we have to take something out or put something in it). We spent most of the month getting Aviella on a nap/sleep schedule. The first few days were horrible (at least for Jamie), but now it is wonderful!! She was a great night time sleeper fairly early, sleeping 7-9 hour stretches. Now she sleeps 11-12 hours at night and just this week she has started a more consistent nap schedule and sleeping close to two hours. Jamie is ecstatic about this!!

We anticipate a fairly busy February and March. Jamie already had another Women's Tea and is also involved in starting a "Parent Support Group" in Family Housing. Ryan turns 31 one this month (Valentine's Day) and Jamie and Aviella will be traveling to WI (Feb. 27 - Mar. 11) to help Jamie's mom after her knee surgery. Ryan will be home alone to work on his research and fend for himself for nearly two weeks (he might not make it through!).

More Pictures

You can find more pictures of Aviella by clicking on the "View my complete profile" link on the right of this blog page. From there click on the "My Web Page" link on the left side of the blog page (under our photo). We will update this Web page with new pictures of Aviella whenever we have new pictures (and time to upload them).

Life with Aviella - The Honeymoon is Over

Aviella is now 5 weeks old. The first two weeks, the honeymoon, were absolute bliss! We loved staring at our beautiful little girl (we still do), holding her, bringing her into bed with us in the morning, hearing her cute little sounds (she's very noisy, I mean talkative), feeding her, changing her, etc. Jamie was a bit tired during this time, but filled with adrenaline so she could handle it, we were very thankful that some neighbors and friends made meals, helped clean, and ran errands for us. Our first big family outing was Asian fast food and Target. Then Jamie got to go to the grocery store without Aviella between feedings. Later we went to a picnic held by Ryan's department, and to church the next day. Jamie took Aviella on errands to various stores. Sometimes it was a disaster and other times it went just fine. Aviella prefers being in the infant carrier rather than her car seat in a shopping cart.


Around week 3 Aviella started getting a bit fussy. Jamie read a book on sleep for infants and children and realized that Aviella's fussiness was likely due to being overtired. Apparently infants can only handle being awake for about two hours before they need to get back to sleep, who knew? At about one hour after waking up Aviella is ready to be asleep or on her way there. Things got better after we realized this. Then the real fussiness started, she was very fussy from about 5pm to 10pm for four nights and then things got better again. Last week the fussiness came back with a vengeance, Aviella sleeps fine during the day, but after 5pm she will not go to sleep until 11:30pm. We can tell she is exhausted and we often get her to fall asleep for 10 minutes to an hour - if we are holding her, she is in a swing, she is in a bouncer, or she is in an infant carrier. Ryan and Jamie have both taken Aviella on walks around Smiley Court to get her to settle down or fall asleep. We have tried gripe water and the chiropractor, so far nothing seems to help. She seems to be uncomfortable or in pain, but we can't do anything to help her. Very frustrating.


Although Aviella is very fussy at night, we still are in love with her and enjoy all the wonderful things about her. It can be draining and stressful at times when she cries so much and won't sleep, but we manage to get through it. Jamie is almost always tired, but finds ways to get a few things done during the day. Ryan has caught up on his homework and TA grading and has a better handle on school and work. He is still fairly busy, but he did find time to make a run to our storage unit to get our fall/winter clothes. Ryan has been successful in getting Aviella to smile for him and she now smiles at mommy too. Jamie cut out some colorful shapes and put them on the wall next to Aviella's changing table, she loves to look at these and they make diaper changing time much better. She even smiles at the shapes.

Jamie's Homebirth Experience

After having read many people's birth stories I am excited to finally be able to share my story. Feel free to skip this one if it is not something you want to learn more about. Don't worry though, I won't be sharing a ton of gory details.

Sunday morning, September 9th I realized that labor was imminent and was glad to have the sightseeing trip with my parents as a distraction. During the sightseeing I had some back pain, but I wasn't sure if it was just discomfort from the car ride or contractions. After the drive through the mountains we went to the grocery store to pick up some last minute items - like the chicken that Judy would need for the chicken soup. When we got home I was completely exhausted! And I really didn't do anything strenuous. I took a nap and realized that my contractions were regular, about every 20 minutes or so. I took a warm bath to relieve some of the pain and to relax a bit; the contractions seemed to slow. After talking with Ryan we decided to let Judy, our midwife, know that my contractions were becoming regular and we discussed again when to call her and that I should try to sleep between the contractions as much as possible to conserve energy.


Later that evening we went out for Mexican with my parents. After dinner we tidied up the house and prepared ourselves for labor to begin. I tried to sleep, but couldn't - partly because of the contractions and partly due to the excitement of the whole thing. I tried another warm bath as it had relieved my pain and slowed the contractions previously - the bath didn't seem to work as well this time, I was relaxed, but the contractions continued and got even closer together. I went back and forth between the bed, the bath and the couch so as not to disturb Ryan and to relieve the back pain I was feeling from the contractions. Finally at 2am, when my contractions were 4 minutes apart I decided to wake Ryan and let him know that we should call Judy. I had wanted both Ryan and Judy to get as much sleep as they could; Judy had been up for over 24 hours the day before at another birth.

When Judy arrived around 4am I was 4 cm dilated - she was surprised that I was already that far along. Judy got started on making the chicken soup fairly soon after she arrived and would check on me and the baby's heart rate at regular intervals. Ryan was a tremendous help in encouraging me to relax and massaging my back during contractions. Unfortunately since I had not been able to sleep at all, most of my day was spent lying in bed. I had tried various positions to go through the contrations in, but the baby's heart rate was the strongest when I was lying on my side. Lying on my side was not exactly how I envisioned myself going through my labor at home. I had hoped to be up and walking around in order to use gravity to my advantage. I do remember telling Ryan that I could see why women would get an epidural, and at that point I hadn't even reached the hardest parts of labor.


Judy had me do some exercises on the stairs to try and encourage my labor to progress. I walked around for a little while after this and hoped to find something funny to watch on TV - laughter is supposed to help labor along too. Nothing good was on TV, but my parents stopped by after touring Celestial Seasonings and before going to a movie. My dad made a few jokes and got me laughing; just as they were leaving my water broke. I believe my dad helped my labor to progress.

When I reached the last phase of the first stage of labor (transition - the cervix dilates from 7 cm to 10 cm) I was blessed to have 6 minutes between contractions and I was actually able to rest/sleep between them in order to prepare myself for the next stage - pushing! This is where another surprise came for both Ryan and I. The baby was not born on our bed as we had envisioned, where I had started the pushing stage, but rather the baby was born on the floor in the small doorway of our bedroom. Judy had encouraged me to try holding the doorknob and squatting down to push - this enabled me to use gravity to help move the baby down. Eventually I was sitting/leaning up against Ryan and pulling myself up to a squatting position during the contractions and pushing. Sadly, Ryan was unable to catch the baby as he had hoped due to the tight quarters of where we were giving birth and the fact that I was sitting on him/leaning up against him between contractions. The transition and pushing stages each took about 2 hours (a total of 4 intense hours). Ryan, Judy and Peggy (Judy's assistant) were all very encouraging in helping me to push and stay as relaxed as possible.


After the baby was born I stayed on the floor with Aviella still attached to the placenta in order to reap the benefits of the rich blood and oxygen she was receiving through the umbilical cord. Ryan cut the cord about 45 minutes after she was born. While waiting for this my mom fed me chicken soup to help me regain some energy and strength. After eating the soup and cutting the cord I was able to breastfeed Aviella. She was amazing, she latched on right away. She had been waiting - sucking on her own hand or Ryan's finger until I was ready to feed her.

This was by far the most amazing thing I have ever experienced in my entire life! And I wouldn't do it differently if I had it to do all over again. I loved being in my own home and being surrounded by people that loved and cared for me (and whom I knew).