Cutie

Luke is such a cutie! Just had to show off some pictures of him and some updates.Here is his precious smile. He gives me quite a few but loves smiling at his Daddy. I think he is a morning person. He is so happy in the morning...or maybe he is just smiling at how much he kept me up the night before. Ha!

But Luke has really become a better sleeper in the last few days. I started putting him on his tummy and he goes to sleep so fast and for a long time. Before, it would literally take 3 or 4 hours to get him down for the night. I would put him down and he would either be wide awake or wake up 5 minutes later. It was pretty tiring and frustrating every night doing that for 3 hours. A few days ago I finally decided I had to put him on his belly because he sleeps so well that way. And it works great! He sleeps 4 to 6 1/2 hours at a time. Praise God for a good sleeper after having Noah! Luke will be 8 weeks old on Friday. I am enjoying him more everyday as he begins to interact with us more. He is such a happy baby and loves smiling. He is really trying to coo and laugh too but can't quite do it yet. So sweet!

We took down Noah's 3 to 6 month clothes from the attic. It is so fun to see Luke in some of the same clothes Noah wore. They seem so small compared to Noah now! Luke is growing fast and it makes me wonder whether Noah or Luke will end of up the bigger boy. It is so neat to see them grow and learn to love each other.

Potty Training

I have grand plans to potty train Noah in May. I will have my parents helping me for a couple weeks so I thought it would be the best time. I can focus on Noah while I have some help with Luke. I am sure they are thrilled! Noah will be over 28 months old. He is definitely smart enough...but is he physically able? We will soon find out!

John and Noah bought his big boy underwear the other day. They are so cute! I think they did a great job picking them out. I am sure I will embarrass him with this blog post someday :) Noah loves his underwear but isn't quite sure what underwear really is.Noah has always had a pretty healthy system. He goes a lot! I remember waiting until the last minute one time to put his swim diaper on (that will not hold pee at all) when we had a group come over to swim last summer. I saw the first arrival in our drive way so I put the diaper on and by the time they got to the door he had already peed through it. Ahhh! On another note, I was told I was lucky one day picking Noah up from the nursery as they said he had a 'big one' while in there. I told them he would have another three or four...they were surprised. It was normal for me but apparently most children only have one a day?

Noah can still go through a diaper in an hour...that kid nurses his drink. He has this special way of holding on to it to the side so that he can play while drinking and not miss anything. I will have to cut back on the drinks if he is going to be potty trained or my day will consist of sitting with Noah in the bathroom with Luke on my shoulder. After Noah is potty trained, it will be a good time to switch him to a cup so that he doesn't drink so much. But, the fact that he drinks a lot will help with potty training cause he will have lots of chances to learn!

Noah doesn't like it when he leaks through his diaper and it runs down his leg so my plan is to just put 'big boy underwear' on him and let it leak down his leg when he goes. We will spend most of the day outside and I will just take him to the portable potty when he goes to let him know he is supposed to go in there. That is my plan anyway...any suggestions on how it worked best for you? I need to read up on a few ideas on how people do it. Did you train your son standing up or sitting down? If he stands up then does he know when he needs to sit down to go #2? The potty was my nieces and it sings when you go. It is pretty cute! Not too excited about cleaning it up though. Hoping he transitions to an inside potty easily too. So much to think about!!!

I didn't think changing Noah to his big boy bed would go well and it went great! It couldn't have been easier. I hoping this is the same...Yes, I know I am optimistic! I will let you all know how it goes!

Bedtime Routine

We are really enjoying seeing our boys grow together and how much they love each other. Noah is such a good big brother and really does well with Luke. Luke is starting to be more alert and really look for the familiar voices he has heard for so long. He will be 5 weeks old on Friday. I am hoping the 6 week mark will be big for him. He is still only sleeping 1 to 2 hours at a time. He has slept 3 and 4 hours at a time only a few times in the last 5 weeks. I still feel rested compared to the zombie I was when I had Noah but look forward to sleeping more!

Here is a picture of the start of our night time routine. Luke is done with his bath and ready to get dressed. Poor guy...he looks so cold! Break my heart ;(Now they are snuggled on the couch while Noah drinks his milk and gets ready for his bath. It is fun to see how much bigger Noah is than Luke!Noah is giving Luke kisses here. He doesn't quite get the fact that he needs to put his lips to his face. He just puts his face on him. So sweet!

Grandpa Don (John's Dad) came from Colorado to meet Luke for the first time this week end. Luke was 4 weeks old. It was fun for him to see him now that he is more alert. Noah had fun playing with Grandpa Don. I like this picture because it looks like Noah is trying to put his arm around Luke.

Here are a couple more pictures of my sweet boys. I am a blessed Momma!

Luke is gearing up for baseball season with this outfit!Here is Noah wearing his elephant ears he got from the zoo...and of course his Thomas the Train shirt. He loves the elephants! We are so glad they are back from Tulsa! We hope to go to the zoo again next week! Noah and I really miss going to the zoo all the time. We used to go at least once a week in Fort Worth as well as the science Museum, Mall play ground, and several other places. We will just have to enjoy our trips to Oklahoma City...but great excuse to see Grammy!!!

Emily (on behalf of John, Noah, and Luke) :)

Brothers

I am really enjoying my boys. It is neat to see how Noah acts toward Luke and how Luke is growing our family. They are both so precious. Noah is such a good big brother. When I was pregnant, I could see Noah loving and adjusting well to Luke and I think he really has. He seems to be pretty loving and gentle with him and always worried about him when he is crying or not in the room. I can't wait to see them be able to play more and more together as Luke grows older. But for now, Noah tries his best to play with Luke.

Here is Noah giving Luke some blue Legos (Yes, Noah is type A like his parents and has to separate the colors). I don't think Noah totally understands how little Luke can do.Another recent discovery for Noah is the art an imagination. He currently loves to pretend to be a dog. And, why would a dog not want to hang out in his dog house...
Here is a picture of Luke's first 'real' bath. We are using the same bath tub that we used with Noah except some of the parts are missing. We are currently plugging the holes with a rag. I put those plugs in a 'special place' when we lived in Fort Worth so Noah wouldn't lose them...and I am not quite sure where that was and whether it was transferred to Weatherford in our move...so they are lost anyway. But, we ordered more plugs and they should be on there way.

I am sure Luke will be pleased with Daddy's hand placement in the future. Luke seems to like his bath besides the getting dressed/putting lotion on/and freezing part. But even through that he just shivers...breaks my heart but we need a clean boy!

You can't quite tell but he is still shivering and waiting for Mommy to warm him! He is such a cutie! It is neat to see him wear this because it was just the other day when Noah was wearing this same outfit! They grow so fast!
Emily (on behalf of John, Noah, and Luke) :)

Noah

I've decided it is probably about time to get Noah a real hair cut. I have really just cut his mullet off every time it grows and done a little on the sides. I was thinking of getting it cut like his Daddy's and thought we would try it out first...

I would say his hair is a little too long for that style...some may think it is pretty 'rad' though!

Here is our sweet Noah sleeping after a long day of play...

Noah loves all the time he gets with his Daddy. Lately, John goes in to get Noah in the mornings since I am normally taking care of Luke. I think Daddy is trying to get a little more sleep in this morning...Noah is not so sure about the idea!
Here is Noah playing with his Daddy. Wrestling is his favorite thing to do with Daddy! The dogs are even hoping for some attention too!

Yes, Noah convinced Daddy to get into the box! He almost fit!

I love my family and enjoy looking at these precious memories over and over again! I am so blessed!

Emily (on behalf of John, Noah, and Luke) :)

Noah's birthday

Noah turned two on Christmas Eve. I can't believe it! He is growing up so fast and already such a smart, happy boy. We had his birthday party in January with family and friends. His birthday theme was balls. Everything all the way to the food was a ball or circle. Here is the cake that Noah's Nana (Great-Grandma) made.Nana also made cupcakes for the kiddos. Noah and his oldest cousin Laney are chowing down on some great food!

Here is a picture of the decorated room...the adults were even able to talk some since the children were occupied with all the toys.
Noah opening presents with Grammy and his cousin, Braden. His favorite toys right now are all his trains. So he was overjoyed to receive Thomas the train stuff.

He is opening his homemade card from Braden. It was precious!

Here is a precious pic with Grandpa and Nana and all the great-grandchildren besides the youngest additions: TJ and Luke.

Noah's party was a blast. It was neat to spend it with so many we love. Thank you all!!!

Emily (on behalf of John, Noah, and Luke)

Noah Meets Luke

I really enjoyed the experience of being pregnant with Noah learning about the whole process. Not the being pregnant part but seeing him learn so much. He would daily put stickers on my belly for Luke. He would hug and kiss 'Luke.' And he prayed for him almost every nap and night time routine each day. He even said, 'Luke' when looking at baby pictures of himself. We also had a couple big brother books that we read often. He really seemed to like the whole idea and I definitely think he understood but I am interested to see how he takes sharing Mommy with little brother so much.

We did not have Noah come to the hospital. We didn't want to expose him to any unnecessary germs and didn't want to deal with him climbing on the bed while I wasn't feeling my best. But as soon as we walked in the door, Noah greeted us and was ready to meet Luke David. Look at his face all lite up. Boy, am I a blessed mother!

Here is Noah taking his first peek as John gets him out of the car seat. He is probably thinking, Dad and Mom weren't kidding when they said baby Luke was going to sit next to him in the car in the seat. Sometimes I wonder if he makes connections like that...like wondering how he got out of my belly and into the car seat...

Time to get to know Luke...

First touch...

Making sure he has all his body parts...

It was such a special time to see Noah meet his little brother Luke David. Noah has had tons of fun playing with Robin Jones (One of Noah and Luke's Weatherford Grandparents), Grammy (John's Mom), and Grandpa and Nana (Emily's parents) while we were at the hospital and this first week as we all adjusted to our new life as a family of four.Before having Luke I couldn't imagine loving another child as much as I love Noah. I thought who could be more fun and joyful, smart and funny, active and loving...but the love I have for Luke is already overwhelming. They say having a child is like having a piece of your heart walk around outside of your body and that is so true!

Emily (on behalf of John, Noah, and Luke) :)

Back Again!

Yes, it has been a long time since I wrote on this blog. For those of you who are new in our lives, we started this blog to share the progress of my pregnancy for friends and family who are far away. We continued as Noah grew and shared our experiences and pictures of the cutest boy in the world, Noah. Now we are back, have a new addition to our family, live in a different state, and have a new job. A family of three to a family of four, Texas to Oklahoma, and Mechanical Engineering position to a pastor at Trinity Baptist Church.

I guess I will start with the pregnancy and birth of Luke David Wohlgemuth. We longed to get pregnant for a while before we were able to try. We were going to try in December but I got kidney stones. I had one so big that I couldn't pass it (7mm...5mm is the biggest a person can pass). I had surgery to have it removed then I passed many more from each kidney the rest of the week while heavily drugged. I had surgery again because my kidneys were so swollen from everything that week. Thus I got a part of my tube shaved off. After all that, I got a bacterial infection! After many testings, a colonoscopy, etc., I finally got over everything by April or so. Yes, it took that long. We wanted to know for sure I was healthy because bacterial infections can cause miscarriage and we certainly didn't want to go through that again. So, finally we were able to try to get pregnant and we did. Praise God!

This pregnancy was completely different from Noah's. I took me a while to bond with this new baby because of going through a miscarriage the pregnancy before. But, after I passed the 13th week (when I had my miscarriage) I slowly began to bond and realize it may just happen. I felt even more comfort as I passed the 25th week since I saw Josie Duggar (on the TLC show "19 Kids and Counting") make it (after much struggle) and thought that maybe this baby would make it. I had a little scare around 23 weeks and thought I was going to lose this baby but I was just dehydrated. I certainly drank a lot of water after that!!! We were excited to have another boy and worked through several names. This was a new experience because John and I had both a boy and a girl name picked around 2 1/2 years before we got married.

The last few weeks were harder than the first, of course. In fact, I only got just over 4 hours of sleep the last 4 days before having Luke. Not so good. I had Noah more than 3 weeks early and Luke came just a day before my due date. I will say it was nice to walk around since I was on bed rest over 9 weeks with Noah after being in a car accident with a friend.

The evening before Luke was born, I started having contractions that were definitely more painful than the Braxton Hicks contractions I'd had for months. I had them consistently all night every 10 minutes. They also got increasingly painful throughout the night but didn't get closer together. By 7am, they were every 6 minutes. By the time we left for the hospital at 8:30am, they were every 4 minutes. I had Luke at 11:11am. I was grateful to do most of the laboring at home. I was VERY uncomfortable in the hospital and it made it much more painful. With Noah I wanted to birth naturally without any pain medicine but had to get an epidural after 14 hours of labor in the hospital after my water broke. I had to push Noah out within 24 hours or I would have had to get a c-section. So, I chose an epidural. It took me 1 1/2 hours to push Noah out after I was dilated to 10 cm.

So this time with Luke, I still brought the same birth plan to the hospital that said NO EPIDURAL. I had discussed it with my OBGYN many times and she was aware of all my requests. I was grateful to do it without even Tylenol. I was very pleased with the experience. I think the contractions were less painful then I had with Noah. I had pitocin increasing every hour with Noah and that just makes them much worse. It is unnaturally forcing your body to contract...not ideal. I've had several people experience it without pain meds and one with pitocin and they thought the same thing. I will birth naturally again if I can have it my way!!! The experience was so much better. I think Luke was more alert (not drugged), it went faster because I was able to listen to my body, and I could push Luke out in 20 minutes because I could feel what I was doing. Yes, it did hurt! And healing was so much faster all around. Plus it is cheaper not to get an epidural...Woohoo! I am really enjoying Luke too. I feel the accomplishment of pushing him out and appreciate it more. I couldn't ask for a better baby either. He is sleeping and eating well and I am sleeping. I got about 1 hour of sleep with Noah in a 24 hour period for about 3 months. I am getting several hours each night. Praise God. Noah also had acid reflux...I hope I never have to do that much laundry again!

With all that said, I love Noah just as much as Luke. Each experience is different as each child is different, even though they look pretty identical at this point! I am sure our third will be even more different. Enough writing, I am sure you just want to see pics...

Grandpa and Nana's 7th great grandchild and 5th great grandson!

Next picture installment will be Noah meeting his little brother, Luke. :)

Love you all,

Emily (on behalf of John, Noah, and Luke)

Packing

Noah enjoyed all our packing. We found out about John becoming the Pastor at Trinity Baptist Church and had two weeks to pack and move. We went straight to business. Noah enjoyed playing in the empty boxes and loved climbing on all the full boxes.
Noah enjoyed climbing in all the boxes so much that he found several other things around the house to climb into.


He also figured out how to climb into the empty book shelfs...

He had to get another swim in before we moved also. He got to have his first naked swim. So glad there were no mistakes!

The boys (dogs) didn't seem to mind all the moving. They get pretty spoiled cuddling with me after Noah goes to bed.

Here is Noah's first time to wear a belt. My boy is growing up! What a cutie!
Em :)

The Cattle Drive at the Stockyards

Monday, Noah and I went to the Stockyards to see the cattle drive and hang out there a little. We brought our lunch and had a picnic too. It was fun.

Noah got his chance to ride on a horse too! He was loving it at first but then got a little scared. After I held his hand while he rode, he looked around at everybody thinking he was pretty cool and that they should check him out. So fun!

Here comes the horse leading the cattle out. Noah was so excited!

Here they go right on by us! Noah even got to pet one!

Bye, Bye cows!

Here is the horse that Noah got to pet. Beautiful animal!


We will miss Fort Worth all the kiddos activities available! We've tried to do everything one last time before we go! What an exciting week it has been!

Emily :)