last of our Christmas pix

while buelo and buela were here we headed to milwaukee to visit the children's museum!



at a deli, daisy is making some sandwiches



working the grocery store checkout... the museum was GREAT and totally worth the $$. Thanks buelo and buela for going with us!



daisy and buela konked out on the way home. =)



buelo multitasking here and maybe even sharing some deep thoughts with Henry.



love this!



cooking with Buela



painting with buelo



all the kiddos with fancy nancy and uncle cookie



and singing a song here - that buela and the kids "wrote" one night while picking up culvers



kissing the baby brother



ems and timmers meeting henry when they got home from Christmas in Cali



Auntie Cyndie soaking up a snuggle


and now to show y'all a peek of what our church has started doing.
gow and his buddy brad put this video together.....

click here: Love in Action

henry's 5 week check up

well our little man henry is doing great!

(we heard sally call him "little man" in the bath tub this last week) =)

On Friday at his 5 week check up he was 13 pounds 10 ounces and 23 1/2 inches long.

he is gaining about a pound a week (surely that will slow down a bit now) and is now wearing mostly 6-9 month clothing. he is a big boy.

he is sleeping 4-9 hours at a time at night. when he does a 9 hour chunk (last night) i feel like i could run a marathon in the morning! =)

he started smiling at 5 weeks- and it makes my heart SOAR whenever he does.

and some super great news... we think his lil hiney is actually healing!
it is looking like MAYBE it was all a reaction to Pampers. which we used exclusively with the girls. soo.... we are using huggies natural care for now to see....

one last fun tidbit... about 3 times a week i can see what the girls have been eating that day as i wash it off his forehead or cheeks. when they came to visit him in the hospital, they left him with oreo morsels on his head. they still continue to smother him with kisses.

and now some more pix...

poopy in the potty!

yup folks! she did it!
daisy kate pooped in the potty and so we headed to culvers for any ice cream (frozen custard) of her choice! some of the local fam were able to join us. super fun to eat ice cream to celebrate daisy kate!

she rocked the potty training world today!

i am sure there will be plenty of accidents in the days/weeks to come... but we are all celebrating in a huge way tonight!

Potty Training with our sweet Daisy Katers

ahhh the journey.

first off- daisy was ready to potty train about 2 months ago.
yup.
but, this momma was so HUGELY prego with our lil chubs Henry, that it literally hurt to sit on our lil chair next to their potty to encourage her..... so we decided to wait. (plus, we were warned that she would probably digress when the baby came anyway).

so our lil man henry is now a month old. actually a month and a week! can you believe it?
(will post about his growth in our next post- don't want to make dk and hj share the spotlight of this post) =)

so, we decided to wait until gow didn't have work so we could TEAM UP to help daisy in the process....

yesterday, gow wasn't suppose to have work.
so we prepped dk on thursday night saying..... tomorrow you get to wear panties!!

so she woke up, picked out a pair of Dora panties, did a little happy dance around her room and the day began!

about an hour later she had peed on the floor and Gow was getting ready to head to Milwaukee for a last minute work deal.

by 10:30 she had peed 3 times on the floor and both her and i were worn out. the house was in upheaval and i needed to drop the girls at grandma and grandpas to take henry to the doc. so we put on a pull up.

in the afternoon- gow was home- she peed in the potty once.... and had a few more accidents.

SIGH.

this morning.... round TWO.
gow and i were READY to focus on her!

2 accidents this again before 9:30....... BUT.....

FIVE successes ever since! and she is running to us letting us know! ahhhh we are calling today a complete VICTORY! =)

who knows what the rest of the day will hold... but i am stoked for what our "Refreshing Spirit" has accomplished so far today! WAY TO GO DAISY KATERS!

henry #2

just want to share this pix... one at a time. =) so i/you/we can savor 'em!



today gow and i were talking about somebody named jonah.
sally says "jonah? that's the guy that got thrown in the lions den! and then ate pizza!"

(there is a veggie tales where daniel gets thrown in the lions den and then has pizza while hanging out with the lions) =)

super funny.

well. Henry did an "eight hourer" last night. woot woot! we are thinking it may have just been a fluke... so not counting on it again tonight. =) but we were STOKED and will celebrate it even if it's just a one timer. =) go little man!

daisy is doing super well with her quiet time (dropping the nap). we are super proud of her and thankful that she's not crabby when she gets tired out. yesterday, we went on a 2.5 minute car ride to grandmas.... and daisy fell asleep on the way. bless her sweet lil heart.

gow's working on his fish tank... cleaning, rearranging rock and cleaning the shells. the clowns continue to be happy with the anemone.


we are moving slow here... but doing well. we are really just living life, gow doing work & worship and we will start back at youth group tomorrow. it has snowed lots, it cold and so it is extra nice to have warm evenings together as a fam at home.

we are blessed and so very thankful.

henry john

cyndie just did an amazing photo shoot of our sweet lil man.
here is one of my absolute faves- that will soon go up on our living room wall.

it's snowing again- suppose to have another 5-8 inches tonight.
funny how it had to warm up so it could snow (it was 3 degrees yesterday.... and 17 today)

happy friday to y'all!

lots of fluffy snow!

oh the snow is fluffy and dreamy!
love it. the flakes have been falling since we all woke up this morning.

the girls came out of their room saying "momma, there is snow falling from the sky!"

and here it is folks... Henry gave a REAL smile today! He won my heart over a bajillion times!
can not wait to have it be an every day part of his lil snuggly life. =)



this is an outing with buelo and buela to the fish store!



the girls posing for us in the fish store.



i think sharon snapped this pix.... henry sleeping while i email/fb/blog. =) classic



ahh here's our lil "lump o love" ( i sooo wish i could bottle up henry's snuggle-ness)



dk hanging out in our "puddle of chocolate"



uncle cookie tickling her... i can almost hear her giggles by looking at this pix.



fancy nancy and cookie- yup- they are naturals! sooooo great with all three of our kiddos!



the girls "jumping rope" - well, not really, but trying REALLY hard to learn how to do it. =)



Nancy, soaking up the snuggles. =)

kitchen fun with buela

some more fun with Buela! this time in the kitchen making jello jigglers, fun shaped grilled cheese sandwiches and all the while wearing their fun aprons that buela made them for Christmas!















on the home front- it is currently 30 degrees with about 4 inches of snow glistening all around.
our low for this week is 1 degree. yup, winter has arrived to los gowanitos!

the girls and gow have already made a snow man, many a snow angel has happened (including the ones that daisy keeps doing in our living room on the carpet) =).

gow has work- Praise the Lord.

daisy has dropped naps and is now in the world of "quiet times" with sally. they typically have an hour- hour and 1/2 in different rooms... and are doing decently at it. bless lil Daisy's heart as she has fallen asleep during books before bed cuz she is zonked. =)

henry is sleeping, eating, pooping, peeing, and doing well. =)
he still has a rash on his hiney- which is requiring us to not use wipes, blow dry his lil hiney with each diaper change and we are changing his diaper about 2 times as often as we did with the girls at this age to try to keep it dry. poor lil man.

i have been calling him "buddy" and "bubba" quite a bit. =)
and he was sleeping 4-6 hours at a time and is now waking up every 4 hours... oh well. =)

daisy continues to bathe henry in smooches. she calls him "my baby". =)
he was never able to wear anything NewBorn, and is already too big for most 3 mo size outfits.
he is sleeping tons, being an absolute sweety and doing well.

gow's at worship practice right now and we have buoy (youth group) with the high schoolers tonight after church at Caribou Coffee.

tomorrow gow's meeting with a (super established) local wedding photographer to pitch the thought of adding wedding videos to his company... could be super great.... pray for God's guidance.....

k. that's it for today.
love to y'all.

gowan family christmas part 1

i have so many fun pix to share from our Gowan Fam Christmas.... so i am gonna chug away and post a bunch at one time. =)



the girls got this tent for Christmas from Buelo and Buela.... Daisy is playing that she is asleep here... and buelo is being awesome and playing princess, queen and babies with her and Sally. Apparently the queen, sally, didn't go IN the princess tent.... =)



the girls got aprons from Buela for Christmas!



the cooked eggs, jiggle jello, and helped buela with other kitchen things.... love these gifts.



the girls getting some buelo snuggle time.





buela painted the girls nails. =)



this is Christmas Day Dinner with John, Sharon, Caleb, Nancy, my folks, Jano and Auntie Karen. we had our Christmas Day Dinner the day AFTER Christmas as the flu bug wiped out half our household on Christmas Day.





Nancy and Buela making it fancy.





we have had some freakish warm weather lately.... and no snow. so buelo was pushing the girls in the back yard before a lake walk one day.



gearing up for a walk



ready to go!



Caleb sick- but still loving on Henry.



watching a movie with Buelo



Christmas Eve Church Service.... Sharon, Alissa, Gow and Nancy on the keyboard





both girls do a fantastic job of holding and caring for Henry.



this is minutes after coming home from the hospital. almost looks like a smile on Henry's face!



Henry in a super snuggly outfit from Maxine!



i love this pix... we played charades and the girls were A) GREAT at it B) really enjoyed it and C) were almost as enthused about clapping after each turn as they were to act and guess. =)



buela acting out "dancing with Prince Charming" - which Sally guessed almost immediately.



another fam meal together.



relaxing together.



Nancy and Caleb walking by the lake on a beautiful, sunny Dec day.



ha ha... Caleb worked super hard to capture this.... the SHEER JOY of a 2 1/2 year old Daisy Kate during our present time on Christmas Eve.



Caleb and gifts



Gow reading the Christmas story before gifts



our lil lump-o-love.



Buelo opening a gift from the girls...

and that is a PEEK into some of the great fam time we had over Christmas. I will try to post one or 2 more to share more pix of our time with the Gowan side of the fam.

love to y'all today.