Random Pics

Noah is already growing so fast. He's awake quite a bit during the day and he has the sweetest smile. We are cherishing every moment with him because we know our baby will be four years old before we turn around.

This is Jacob's "cute" face. It's the face he makes when he gets in trouble, because it makes Lou and I laugh and makes it hard to get onto Jacob for whatever he's doing. How do they get so smart so young?

Our Princess is Four!

One of my hobbies is decorating cakes...I do cakes for all the kids' birthdays. I thought this one turned out pretty good considering I was trying to take care of a newborn while decorating.

I can't believe she's four!!! It seems like just yesterday she was Noah's size. We had a family party at home...with Nana, Papa, Mom-mu, Grandad, Aunt Rachel, Uncle Jeremy, cousin Pacey, Aunt Sarah, cousins Reaghan and Ethan, and of course her three brothers and Mommy and Daddy. What a blessing she is to us!

Life with Four Kids

Madilyn and Benjamin were in our church's kid's pageant at Christmas. Madilyn was a hummingbird and Benjamin was a lamb. Madilyn only had one line and it was with all of the hummingbirds...Benjamin had three lines and did really well at memorizing them and speaking loud enough for everyone to hear and understand him. They are still, a month after the Christmas pageant, walking around the house singing their songs. It was the cutest Christmas program EVER!!

Noah was bundled up to go to the doctor...he looks like the kid on the movie, "A Christmas Story".

The kids are anxiously waiting for Mommy to get ready so we could all go to church. Let me just tell you that getting four kids and myself ready to go to church all by myself (since Lou has to be there so early) is no easy feat. It's a good thing I only have one girl that has to have her hair done. I seriously don't know how my mom did it with four girls.

Introducing Noah Adley Ellerbrook

Noah Adley Ellerbrook was born on December 2, 2008. He weighed 7 lb, 9 oz and was 19.5 inches long. In the first hour after he was born, his blood sugar dropped. They got it back up within the normal range and we were able to go home from the hospital the next day.

Within 24 hours of being home, he was very jittery again (a sign of low blood sugar)--so we took him to the dr. After testing his blood sugar and jaundice levels, they wanted him back in the hospital. So we spent another 4 days in the hospital trying to get his blood sugar levels up and keeping them up (which happened the first night we were there) and getting his jaundice levels down (which is what took 4 days). While he was back in the hospital, Benjamin got strep throat and proceeded to share it with Lou, Madilyn, and Jacob. I was the only one that did not get it (at least that week). I have never been more overwhelmed in my life--being in the hospital with a sick newborn, having three sick kids who needed their mommy (but mommy couldn't be there because she was at the hospital), and having a sick husband who couldn't be much help because he felt so bad and was trying to keep from giving it to me or the baby. Good thing parents and grandparents came to our rescue!!

The Zoo (and, no, I don't mean our house)

At the baby shower that the ladies at the church threw for me, the hostesses got our family a membership to the Abilene Zoo. It's a pretty good zoo for being in the size town that it's in. So, in November, we took the kids on a Saturday that was pretty. The kids got to feed a lot of the animals. They had a blast! It was a very special day for us, because it was one of our last Saturdays as a family of five. I will forever cherish this day, also, because it was one of the last that we saw Jacob as a "baby" (even though he's 2 1/2 years old).

October Pics

Benjamin got to play his second season of soccer this fall. He's not very aggressive, but he enjoys playing.

This picture was taken on Halloween while Benjamin was at school. Jacob did not get to go trick-or-treating or help pass out candy to trick-or-treaters later that day because he was in BIG trouble. The kids went outside to play that afternoon and, after they had been out there about 20 minutes, Lou's administrative assistant called our house and said that Jacob was at the police station. He had gotten out of the backyard, went across the alley, through the church playground, and was standing in the middle of the street ON main street, right in front of the police station. Talk about a scary situation. We were very fortunate someone from the church was downtown trick-or-treating at some of the businesses and knew who Jacob was. Talk about every parent's worse nightmare....

This picture was taken a couple of days before Halloween...it was the night of the Hallelujah Festival that happens in downtown Clyde. The kids actually all wore the exact same costumes they wore last year...Benjamin our dinosaur, Madilyn our princess, and Jacob our pirate (who by the way was wanting somebody to put some candy in his bucket already).

Pics from September

So, I'm a little behind on my postings...here's some random pictures of the Ellerbrook family from the fall. This one is Jacob being a pirate. He has become obsessed with them. He loves Peter Pan, Hook, Jack Sparrow...anything pirate.

I found the kids attempting to sit on Jacob's lap one day. They were so amused with themselves.

On Friday nights, Benjamin and Madilyn get to have "sleepovers"--which means, they get to each choose a movie to watch, eat popcorn, and sleep in the playroom on their sleeping bags. Now, they each have their own sleeping bag, but we went in one evening and found Madilyn had crawled into Benjamin's with him. She just LOVES her big brother! They have a pretty special relationship (well, at least when they're not yelling at each other). By the way, you may notice that Madilyn is topless--let me just say that the girl has some sort of aversion to pajamas. We put her to bed wearing them, and she wakes up without them--it doesn't matter how cold it is, she takes them off once she's in bed.