My Handsome Little Man

I admit I think Sam is so handsome.
My handome boys!

I tried to get a picture of all three of the kids but getting three kids under three to all pose at the same time takes an act of God!

Isn't he handsome?!

It's A Boy!

So Friday night at 7:30 I had my baby shower and it rocked. I didn't get home until 1:00 AM so I promptly went to bed. Then at 3:00 AM I woke to a nasty contraction. As soon as it was over I tried to go back to sleep but after 5 minutes I had another one. Despite my great desire to get Samuel out I wasn't looking forward to going through labor on only two hours of sleep so I spent the next three hours trying to go back to sleep between five minute apart contractions. Finally around 6:00 AM I decided to give up and told James we'd better go so Niki came over to watch the girls and we headed for the hospital around 7:00. At the hospital they checked me and I was only a 3 and Samuel hadn't decended enough so they told me to walk for an hour to see if I was going to progress or if it was false labor. So I walked until 9:00 and they checked again and I was a 6 and he was ready to come so they got us to the labor/delivery/recovery room and started the IV and got me preped for the epidural. By 10:00 AM I had the epidural and was feeling much better. Around 11:30 he was ready to come and I was really starting to regret not going to bed earlier. Samuel Wild Briscoe was born at 11:47 AM weighing 7 lbs. 5 oz. and measuring 20 1/4 inches long.

James got a job!!!

We are so excited to announce that James is employed and even better it is in the field he graduated in! As most of you know James spent last semester student teaching and graduated with his bachelors in Music Education last month. Well today was his first day as a contracted teacher! He's working as an Assistant Choir Director at a local middle school. We are so excited!!! The best part is that the school he is working at doesn't change semesters until the 20th of January so right now all he is doing is helping the choir director. So if we can get this baby out before the 20th James won't even need to get a substitute because he doesn't have any real responsibilities but yet they are paying him full salary with 5 days of paid time off! Did I mention we're extatic to have him employed?!

Waiting...

Now that the holidays are over we are just waiting for little Samuel to join us. I'm not due until the 27th but I'm hoping to have him on the 14th if I can talk him into it. If I get desperate enough I'm gonna track down some good 'ol caster oil. I had a doctor's appointment on Tuesday and the doctor did an ultrasound which predicted him to currently weigh 6 lbs. 13 oz. which means if he gains the half a pound a week that he is supposed to and he goes to his due date he'll weigh over 8 lbs. 13 oz! Did I mention I'm kicking him out early?!

Christmas Morning!

We didn't actually start Christmas morning until around 10:00 AM because both of the girls were sick. Eliza had a cold and Charity was puking on Christmas Eve so they both slept in. But once they realized that they got to open presents they were pretty happy.

We spent over an hour opening presents because once the girls got one opened all they wanted to do was play with it. We had to force them to put each gift down and open another. I expect next year they'll understand it better and burn through their presents like normal children.



This is the kitchen set we got the girls for Christmas. We bought it from a friend for $30 and the girls just love it.

Christmas Decorations

I know Christmas was last week but for those who were curious this is how are house is decorated this year.

James got me this vase for Christmas and the girls bought me the flowers.

Christmas Party!

On Friday, we went to a ward Christmas Party that was really fun. We had dinner and James sang in the program and the girls got to see Santa! I was quite surprised that neither of the girls were afraid of Santa so we were able to get some pretty good pictures.