What happened to the Van Roekels?

Hello Everyone!

What has it been one and a half years since our last update! So long I hardly know where to begin. We do not face-book or tweet or any other fancy forms of communication so I do apologize to our beloved friends who only hear whats going on in our lives from our blog. We love you we really do. It has taken me this long to finally take the time and start blogging again.

After our Washington DC trip and our last post. God amazed us again, we were expecting a THIRD CHILD! We cried when we found out we were expecting Lily and Alexander. This time we were speechless and when the shock wore off we laughed! Baby was due in early May! Lily had not even turned 3 yet! Wow, to think the years that we really wanted children. Boy were we making up for lost time!

Pregnancy in a nutshell:

Much more difficult this time. I got Pneumonia early in my pregnancy and could not take any thing that would get rid of it. So I had pneumonia for a few weeks hoping to get a little farther along without taking any medication. It got to the point however, that my doctor was worried that I was going to miscarry so he did give me antibiotic. I took 2 rounds of it to clear it up.

A few weeks after I was over the pneumonia I got food poisoning! Not Fun!

Much more tired this time around. Mostly due to running after two kids.

3 weeks of bed rest. Really hard for me to have Lily and Alexander have to go somewhere else everyday. Family and Friends were so awesome to help out with watching our kids and bringing us meals.

May 4
Really fast Labor! 8:00 Contractions start. There were no 15 min. apart. Every Contraction was 3-5 min Closer than the previous one. 8:30 Jeff was pulling his pizza out of the oven at home. I said we have to go now! He was not moving fast enough for my liking. Nor were the nurses or the doctor.

Abigail Esther Van Roekel was born at 9:27 pm no pushing needed. If the doctor would have been around I know I could have push her out 10-15 min earlier. ( Sorry guys, too much info, but the girls love the details!)



Lily was very excited about a baby sister. Alexander was not ready to be the middle child or maybe he was hoping for a brother. It took him a few days to realize that mommy was going to need to hold the baby a lot.

The picture below is one of my favorites b/c Lily is asking "Did God take the baby out of your tummy?" I say "yes" Lily responds " So now you can bend over?!" Love It!


We'll close today on that. Promise to keep posting.

Virginia Part 2

One of the fun things we did while we were in DC is we went back to the Linclon Memorial. We had taken Lily's picture there last time and took some of the same shots as last time. I think she grew a little.

Jeff with Lily in May 2oo7 and with Alexander and Lily Last week.

Virginia

We made it to Virginia. Sunday morning we left in the Van for Virginia. We took both Kids and they traveled so well. Jeff and I were very impressed. They really didn't get upset at all. WE traveled 12 hours the first day and stayed at a hotel in Michigan City. They kids were ready to swim and run around for a while. We started out fresh the next morning and arrived at Jeff's Aunt and Uncle's around 7:00 pm.

We could not believe the toll Roads and the prices!

Korean Memorial

This memorial is special to us since Jeff's grandpa served during the Korean War.

Fountain in front of the National Archives









National Park we visited.

This is what they are looking at. These little guys were running around on this board walk to the falls. They were way to close for comfort for this girl.
I told Bev that I like wild life behind glass at the zoo, She agreed. I was a little jumpy after seeing these little guys.



More to come

Alexander Turns 1!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

Last Saturday we celebrated Alexander's birthday. We had such a good time and were able to enjoy the day with many family members and friends. Jeff had to do the dad thing and rent a blow up castle. I'm sure Alexander will remember it forever:) The adults had just as much fun and the kids did.

The kids were very amazed at mommy jumping, something
I must not do very often:)

So we are on a kickball league

Yes, it is true we are on a kick ball team which plays real games on a city league. Who would have thought. Certainly not me. When Jeff came home and announced a few months back that Luan had this crazy idea to have a Sencore kick ball team I simply just laughed. He said yea Russ is designing shirts, our team name is We're Huge in Japan. (The engineers were/are very excited about their creative name). I however have no idea what my number is due to it being written in binary on the back of my shirt. There is also some Japanese written there as well, I have not even asked what that stands for.

They said they had need for girls to play so I said sure. I mean it's kick ball people, who takes kickball seriously. Apparently kickball leaguers.

Our first game we lost by a landslide. I don't even think we got one run in. It was 1 out, 2 outs, 3 outs. back to the field. We struggled Umps telling us about the rules, opponents upset b/c someone was standing in the baseline, bad ball handling, outfielders standing with their hands in their pockets. Meanwhile I'm thinking to myself, I don't think that I'm the only one out hear who was lasted picked in gym. What are we doing out here? I thought this was a child's' game.

So the next day at Sencore, Sara (who is just a little competitive) rallied up the guys and they started a game plan. They even made a line up.

The next game I was not in the line up so Lily and I cheered on the team. They didn't win but it was not near as embarrassing as the time before.

So this week I was in the line up. About 5:00 it starts to pour down rain. I call Jeff and ask"what about the game"? He replies " apparently we play" "You've got to be kidding me" were the exact words out of my mouth. So there I was, last picked in gym, heading to a kickball game in the pouring rain. Fortunately, the rain stopped during the first inning. We had to leave the field for awhile because of lighting. It ended up being a great time and we actually won. I have know idea what the score was, I never keep track.




Lily gets excited to go to the games. This is at our second game.

Such a Funny Girl

Two really is a fun age. I absolutely love watching Lily learn about life everyday and attempting to see life through her eyes. Lately I have been just sitting back and admiring this great gift God has entrusted to us.
Here are some of my Favorites lately.

Lily has these pink sunglasses that she loves. She put them on the other day and I asked her "If she was a cool cat" She responded by saying "No, I'm a girl, Mommy" I had to laugh out loud.






Apparently it is easier to feed Alexander if you hold your mouth wide open as well.

This little house was one of our garage sale finds. A Whole dollar. When she was playing with it later that afternoon she was all excited "look at all the peoples Mommy!" I said" Wow that is so cool Lily, but who is that" I was referring to the lone man in the bathroom. She responds with a matter of fact "Daddy" Another Laugh out Loud moment.




My College roomie Sandra turned 30 in may, her husband threw her a little surprise party. So us old roomies and our kids were all together. Above Lily is meeting Kendra, Ryan and Lorinda Breems' daughter. Lily had been at a birthday party earlier in the day with all boys. She was so excited to see Kendra. I think Kendra was a little overwhelmed. It's something I love about her. She has such a tender heart. Plus we had to get their picture taken together since they were dressed so much alike.

It was really cute, the first thing she did when she saw her was pointed her finger at her. "Your a girl!" Then she bent down touched her shoes and said "I like your shoes!"

I love it all girl!

Latest Project

Jeff took some time off around the 4th of July to work on our Landscaping project. It was the first time that he had not gone camping over the 4th in probably 20 years or more. It was time well spent. We worked on the rock retaining wall, leveled out the black dirt and even clean the garage on the rainy days.

It was a lot of fun to go the gravel pit, pick out our rocks and bring them home to make the wall. We had a huge load. We took back roads back to Sioux Falls to avoid a ticket, but that was scary too because we had to go over a bridge that said it's weight limit was 6 tons which we were way over.

After we hauled the rocks home I noticed baby birds up under the hitch. I felt horrible! We borrowed the trailer from Sjaardas so here we had taken the babies all the way to Sioux falls away from their mommy. I was quite concerned b/c Sjaardas live in Minnesota. How were the babies going to eat with out their mommy?! Well the horrible truth is they don't. They died a couple of days later. I felt and still do feel terrible. I knew I should have called animal control then maybe I wouldn't have this guilt gut.

Micheal came and gave us some pointers the first night to help us get started.



Lily loves to ride in the
scidloader with Daddy. " I drive it Mommy"
She rode for hours with Jeff.
Alexander loves to watch too. He likes to be outside, here is a clip I caught quick at the end of a tantrum he had after I brought him inside.

My Gladiator

I was very impressed with my husband this weekend. In one afternoon he finished the middle section of the wall for the patio area. Then at five o'clock he started the wall that starts behind the garage goes around the dog kennel and back around the garage to the front of the house. He was finished a little after Seven o'clock. It was incredible hot that afternoon. It's really something to look at that wall and think how Jeff placed each one. Jeff you are such a hard worker it looks so nice thank-you.