Christmas Day!

Merry Christmas from the Gillespie's. We are not going to be getting out Christmas or New Year's cards this year so we hope that everyone has had a great Christmas and will have a blessed year in 2010. We feel so blessed to have Claire here and healthy and to be able to start the new year with a family of 4. It's a little scary, but everything seems to be working pretty good so far.

We had a great Christmas this year and just wanted to share some of the pictures. We went to the Brooks for lunch and hung out for the afternoon. Everyone got to love on Sadie and Claire and we ate a great meal. This year, we taught Sadie a little about celebrating Jesus' birthday on Christmas. We can ask her, "Who was born on Christmas" and she puts on finger up in the air and yells, "Jesus!" It is really cute.

Here we are. Our family of 4.
This picture just shows the reality of our Christmas morning. Sadie "helping" change Claire's diaper while saying she needed to go potty at the same time and her pajama pants falling off because they are a little big. She also found her hat that she thought she had to have on. I just had to laugh!

I thought I had rotated this picture, but I guess not. Oh, well, here is Claire all dressed up for Christmas. She got bottles from Santa. That's about all she is interested in right now.

Sadie got 2 goldfish from Santa. She was pretty excited. She probably would have liked a puppy more, but we are nowhere ready for that.

Here she is with her other presents.

Christmas 2009

So I'm going to start with Christmas Eve and hopefully be able to blog about Christmas Day soon. We had a very relaxing Christmas this year, or as relaxed as you can be with a newborn at home. Anyway, Claire slept through just about everything and Sadie seemed to have a great time. I was determined to do some kind of Christmas cookies so we ended up making slice and bake snowman cookies about 10 minutes before her bedtime. I don't think she really understood leaving cookies for Santa. It really upset her that she had to leave the cookies (even though we let her eat one).

Here is Claire. Sleeping away her first Christmas Eve.

Sadie got some new pajamas that she opened Christmas Eve. They are Minnie Mouse. Big surprise!


This is quite possibly my favorite picture from Christmas. Sadie with her cookie.

Nothing like a cookie straight out of the oven right before bedtime.

Making cookies really fast with the help of Nana. We wouldn't have gotten it all done without her!

A beautiful baby girl!

We've been home from the hospital a few days now and I am feeling pretty good. Still recovering, but it hasn't been as bad as last time which I am very thankful for. Claire is a beautiful little girl and is doing great. I am so thankful she is healthy. We've had a little trouble keeping her weight up and I'm trying not to worry too much. It's hard to do when they are so little. Sadie is doing great with her too and Gabe is the best Daddy ever.

My parents got us a cute little door sign at the hospital.

Sweet baby Claire!

Daddy with Claire.

We had a great nurse that brought Claire over as soon as she could and let me hold her. She was really great.

A great Christmas present!

Claire is here!!

This is Gabe blogging:) Claire Hope Gillespie arrived at 7:58 a.m. Dec 18th. She weighed 7 lbs. 12 oz. and is 21 inches long. Mom is recovering great from the c-section and Claire has arrived to much fan fare! Sadie is a great big sister and was very sweet to Claire when she saw her and mom for the first time. When she walked in we said "This is baby Claire we've been talking about" and Sadie waved and said "Hi baby, Hi mama"

Claire looks almost identical to Sadie, only with a head full of BROWN hair (not pictured here).

We will post more pictures soon, but for now...Mom is doing great and Claire is SUPER cute!!

Update on Claire

Just thought I would give a quick update on the pending arrival of Claire. So far, we are still on for a C-Section in 6 days. (December 18.) The doctor said that everything looks great and I go for my last appointment this Thursday. I am very ready for Claire to get here and for me not to be pregnant anymore. I can't complain about anything and the pregnancy has gone great, I am just feeling huge, not sleeping well, and getting anxious. I am ready to figure out this 2 kids thing and get going. Yesterday was my last day of work and I am "planning" on getting tons done this week. All the family is coming in Thursday so that gives me three days to get it done. I won't even go into the length of the list I have come up with. Gabe always knows I'm getting stressed/anxious when I start making a list. He has been so great though. He has really been trying to get some stuff done that there is no way I could do like putting things in the attic and hanging things above the crib. He really is the best!

So, if all goes as planned, we will be welcoming Claire on Friday morning. We'll post pictures as soon as we can. Please pray for a safe delivery and a healthy, happy Claire.

Christmas Parade 2009

This year was the first year that we went to the Christmas Parade. We thought we would see how Sadie would do. At first she didn't really know what to think, but she quickly figured it out. She stood at the side of the road just watching for a little while, but once Mickey and Minnie showed up she was way into waving and so excited. All the way home she was saying, "saw Minnie Mouse." Last week, Santa went to her school and took pictures. When Santa went by and we told her to say Bye, Bye to Santa, she said, "See you at school Santa." She just makes us laugh everyday!

It was really difficult to get any good pictures, but here's the best we could do. Enjoy.

Family Photo

Sadie and Gabe waiting for the parade to start.

Sadie pretty much just stared at everything for the first few minutes.

This one is really hard to see, but it's Mickey and Minnie. This was Sadie's FAVORITE. She could hardly believe that they were really that close. She LOVES Minnie Mouse right now.

... and here is Santa. Sadie loved seeing him too and actually knew who he was.

A Conversation with a 2 year old

Sadie was finished eating the other night and wanted to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. Here was our conversation.
Sadie: "Watch Minnie, Watch Minnie!"
Me: "Can you say that nicely?"
Sadie: "Nicee." (Nicely)

What could I say to that?