September 16

2 days before Kendall arrived!
In triage--waiting for a room.

Lots of contractions...no fun.

Finally got my room...and my epidural!!!

And then the epidural stopped working in some areas...ugh.

But soon, it was all better! Kendall is here!!!

Same weight as Casey and only 1 inch shorter...

Getting her first bath!

Hello!!!

Meeting Grammy and Pappy!

Casey got there and she was asleep!!

So I cuddled her awake! I missed her!

And here's your little sister, Casey!

Casey's sister got her a present...

A Cinderella dress...she loved it...can you tell???

Thank you, Kendall!!!

Cuddling with my big girl!

Bye little sister, see you tomorrow!

With my daddy!

With my mommy!

The girls =)

Coming home!

With my Grandma

Hi All~

As promised a "birth story"...

It's funny because as I type this, one week ago I was just beginning my journey through labor. Thursday, September 9th, I dropped Casey off at preschool and went to my routine 38 week doctor appointment. All went well at the appointment. Kendall was active on the monitors, I had plenty of fluid, and I was 3 cm dilated and 50% effaced. Nothing to indicate labor was right around the corner as I'd been dilating a bit for the past 2 weeks. I left the appointment, got a dunkin donuts iced coffee and bagel and came home to eat and wait to go pick Casey back up at school. Around 11am I realized I was really, really uncomfortable and had been for about 15 minutes...I quickly realized why...I was contracting every 2-3 minutes!!! I called the doctor and they said to sit down and drink water...well, I'd been doing that when the contractions started! I called Kyle and we decided he'd leave work and go pick up Casey and drop her at our friend Allison's house (who had been prepared to take her when the time came!) I got to the hospital and on the monitors around 1230, by 130 I was dilated to a 4, but still not effacing anymore, nor had the baby "dropped"...they let me labor for a while and then they had me walk for one hour. At around 4pm, we were told to go home (even though I was still having contractions every 2-3 minutes and starting to get really tired!!!) The nurses were pretty confident that I'd be back that night...they told me to go home and keep walking and eat a light dinner. So we had Casey stay at Allison's--went home and took one walk, ate dinner, and then another walk. We sat for a bit and around 9pm we left to go back to the hospital. The hospital was PACKED with mom's in labor. I had to lay in triage for about 4 hours until we knew we were definitely being admitted -- my contractions were still happening every 2-3 minutes and were getting stronger--but I still hadn't dilated past 4cm!!! BUT at 130 ish I was finally admitted and got my epidural! Woo hoo! We finally knew at this point we were having a baby!

By 430, I had dilated to 5cm with the help of some pitocin and the doctor broke my water. By around 8ish, I was at 6cm, but not effacing and my epidural was starting to wear off in spots (boo)...So things went quick after this. Around 830 they turned the pitocin up a bit. I was fully dilated in 45 minutes (915) and I really, really wanted to push, but Kendall hadn't dropped down yet. They said I needed to wait a little longer...10 minutes later, I said there was no way I could wait and they checked me and she had completely descended in those 10 minutes. I started pushing at 931 and three sets of pushes later, she was born at 940am!

So she is doing great. She slept A LOT the first few days of her life...now that she's settled in at home a bit, she's a little more alert. She seems to hit a rough patch each night for about 2 hours (usually middle of the night) where she wants to eat a bunch and be held, not sleep in her pack and play. But 2 hours of a little fussing -- not so bad...especially for all of you who remember Casey and her 6-8 hour colic each day!

Casey loves her baby sister. She loves to "pet" her. She loves to watch us change her diaper. And the greatest ever was today when she came in the door from school, she immediately asked, "Where's my baby sister?" and got right down on the floor with her to say Hello and gave her lots of love!

Anyway---I'm going to get to attaching a bunch of pictures now. Enjoy and hope to update again soon!!!

Love,
Katie, Kyle, Casey, Kendall, and Jimmy

September 10

Happy Birthday Kendall!!!

I promise to write more (like my whole long and exciting labor and delivery story) once we get home tomorrow (it's Saturday morning right now)...but for now...here are 3 pictures of our newest addition, Kendall Jordyn Kilian!

She and her big sister got to meet yesterday afternoon and Casey was excited to finally see her, but mostly excited that her little sister got her a Cinderella dress that she apparently has to be pried out of at bedtime and was putting back on first thing this morning. I really hope she shows up at the hospital in it today...ha ha ha!

Love you all~~~can't wait for you to meet her!

Katie, Kyle, Casey, Kendall, and Jimmy

August 31st

Hi all~~
Not too much new going on down here. Just wanted to post some pictures from Casey's first day of preschool! All went well! Hope she's just as excited to get up and go again on Thursday!

Love,

Katie, Kyle, Casey, Baby Kendall, and Jim

August 22nd

Smiles =)

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

Kyle's scotch =)

Happy 33rd!

9 months =)

Happy Birthday, Jimmy!

6 years old!

Little sister, big brother...waiting for their newest sibling =)

Hi everyone~~~
We had a fun week of celebrating the "boys" birthdays. Kyle's on Tuesday and Jimmy's on Saturday. Both got their requested meals and "desserts". And presents, of course!!! We got to visit with the girl I co-taught with, Jen - when we lived in Virginia and her boyfriend, Mike - on Saturday night. We met up with them in Savannah for dinner. It was a really fun night and Casey had a lot of fun eating and then hanging out coloring, running around, etc. in the lobby of a hotel/bar area! Yes, we had our baby in a bar...ha ha!

Oh and the big news of the week, if you hadn't already heard, Heather's 2nd scan came back clear!!!!

Not too much else new. We hope you are all well and we'll post more soon~~~

Love,

Katie, Kyle, Casey, Baby Kendall, and Jimmy

August 16

Hi everyone,

So we hung the pictures in Kendall's room tonight and I took pictures in both girls rooms...Casey now has her "big girl" room. It's as neat as I usually can get it in the pictures. She LOVES her stuffed animals and dolls...there are about 20 she NEEDS to have in bed with her at night...you'll see as you page down.

We are really happy with the way Kendall's room turned out. I wasn't too sure how it would be to decorate a nursery around brown walls (as we really didn't want to repaint in a rental home)...but think it looks pretty great! Hope Kendall likes it!

Not too much else new here. Kyle had a really nice trip up to Myrtle Beach this past weekend and Casey and I missed him, but did lots of fun stuff, too! I took Casey to her first movie on Saturday. We saw Cats and Dogs in 3D. Casey did really well, we made it a little over and hour into the movie and she was hungry and didn't want to wait the extra 10-15 minutes for the movie to be over, so we left early! She's talked about it a lot and will tell you it was dark and loud, that the cat was mean and bad, and it was funny that the animals were talking.

Well, enjoy the pics and talk soon~

Love,
Katie, Kyle, Casey, Baby Kendall, and Jimmy

Casey's bed w/all her friends...
Book shelf

Closet

Toys =)

Bigger view of the room

What her bed usually looks like--a mess of animals, dolls, and books...

Baby Kendall's closet

The crib and wall hangings...

Changing table and wall hangings...

Window/valance

Another view of crib area and rocker...

View from the entrance of the room...

August 13

Yelling at me to stop taking her picture.
Trying to chase me away.

MOM!!!

Now she's happy=)

Sliding!

Steaming hot!

Seriously, my lense was fogged up it was so humid!

Pigtails!

Casey dancing~~~

Hi everyone!

Not too much new here. We are still enduring some pretty high heat and humidity. Maybe next month will bring us some relief (and a new addition!)

I'm feeling well, just really tired some days. Casey is doing great. We finished her back to school shopping yesterday. She's so excited. Kyle is doing well, too. He is up in Myrtle Beach this weekend with some of his buddy's from law school.

Enjoy the pictures and videos and we'll be in touch soon!!

Love,

Katie, Kyle, Casey, Baby Kendall, and Jim

August 1

Stopping for a quick drink and snack break during an afternoon of swimming.
Casey and Jake walking back from the pool.

Sooooo cute. We had them hold hands to slow them down a little, but if you could've seen them trying to figure out how to actually grab each others hands and start walking together...it was too funny!!!

Baby Kendall's bed =)

Another angle. Just waiting on a few more pieces and we should be able to share pictures of the completed nursery!

Casey and Daddy playing on the floor in Baby Kendall's room.

Casey really enjoys her sister's new playmat!

8 months!

And a front view, woo-hoo!

Love that she still falls asleep like this in the car...this was after church today!

Hi all~~

Not too much new here. Just wanted to share a few pictures. I had my 32 week doctor appointment this week and all went well. I go again at 35 weeks and then I'll go weekly after that!

Casey is doing great. She 'met' one of her preschool teachers today at church. I wrote 'met' because Ms. Jessi has always been in the nursery on Sundays but I never knew her name (bad mommy). So when I took Casey in today after children's sermon, Ms. Jessi introduced herself as one of Casey's teachers and said that she requested to have Casey in her class this year because she enjoys her in the nursery so much! Awww =) I'm really excited about this also, because I think it will be great for Casey to have a familiar face in the room at the start of the year. She was VERY concerned when we pulled into church today that we didn't bring her glue sticks along (one of the only supplies we've purchased on her back to school list!!) ha ha ha!

Kyle's been busy as usual at work. He is heading out fishing this afternoon with his friend Charlie. I don't know how they do it in this heat and humidity. I'd want to keep jumping in the water!

Well, hope to post again soon~~~

Love,

Katie, Kyle, Casey, Baby Kendall, and Jim