Christmas came.

What a Christmas! This is the only picture to post because it really says it all.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, on to finishing out the year!

Whoow!!! What a crazy past few days

Well, we were trying to avoid it but Jen had to go in to have surgery for the ectopic pregnancy. She passed out at home and Matt called an ambulance to take her to the ER. Doctors there figured out that the pregnancy had rupture and need emergency surgery. The Surgery went well, only an hour long but she lost a lot of blood. 6 units overall were transfused through out the whole ordeal.
We have had tons of support and help from our friends and family. Our neighbors across the street sat at our house with Emma from 11pm - 6am the night Jen went in. My parents are here right now taking care of Emma and the house while I am at the hospital with Jen.
Jen will now have to take it easy and enjoy a relaxing Christmas at home with everyone taking care of her.
To add to all of this, her whole family is still in Hawaii on the family vacation that we were supposed to be on too. We are so blessed our doctor recommended we not go on the trip.
Praise the Lord!!
Matt

A day we will not forget

We wanted to share the last 48 hours of what has been going on in our family.

Two days ago Jen took a pregnancy test with the result coming back positive. We were of course excited, but nervous because of some spotting that had been going on. After a few visits to the doctor and some blood being taken, we found that it was an ectopic pregnancy (a pregnancy outside of the uterus making miscarriage inevitable). Today was spent most of the day doing ultrasounds, taking more blood and discussing our options. The least invasive option was to take a drug to facilitate the natural process while reducing the risks to Jen's health. The most difficult part of this timing was having to cancel our trip with Jen's family (we were leaving Friday morning for Hawaii with the whole family). Hard part now over: God's peace and healing now comes in. The Lord's provision has been all over Jen's health and safety. Because we found it so early Jen has not had pain or any ruptures (both are very much associated with this). Also because we found it this early we were able to avoid surgery which could have upped the chances of this happening again with future pregnancies. We are grateful for the Lord's hand in this situation, as difficult as it has been. Doctors orders for Jen to relax and stay close by for a few weeks, which means Matt gets to do the cleaning and cooking for a while (Jens interpretation). We appreciate prayers just for continued healing emotionally and physically. He is good and we can only continue to trust Him, even during difficult times. We will be sure to update as things progress, but for now we wait and enjoy a holiday at home with a healthy family.

Thanksgiving in Pictures

We had a great time celebrating Thanksgiving in Santa Fe. The flights were so good, the food was great, played in snow, and needless to say Emma had plenty of attention from Pops, Susu, Nana, and Papa. Here are just a few pictures from the fun week.

Rainy Day Fun

It rained almost all day today, but that did not stop us from having some good times. We played in the puddles a little, did lots of laundry, and went to the Christmas Tree lighting. I love the holidays!

On the Mend

Well what a week of sickness it has been.  Matt came home from Peru with a little something that he passed to both Emma and myself.  I recovered pretty quickly (with the help of Matt playing mom) but Emma has taken some time to get past it.  Today we finally decided to take her to the doctor after a long night of high temps.  Hopefully it is just a virus but we should know in the next 24-36 hours.  BUT, with all of the sickness, spirits have been pretty normal around here.  Emma also turned 9 months old last week!  No, she has not been out of the belly as long as in, that will be next week, but she is still such a joy even with the sickness.  New mad skills: crawling and clapping.  We did manage to get some pictures of Emma in her pink octopus on Halloween (5 minutes post sickness)and some 9 month pictures (5 minutes pre sickness).  Hopefully soon we will all be back to normal, until then we will enjoy the snuggle time!

Little crawler

Emma loves going from her room and down the hallway, it is just too cute!  We got this video about one day after she started the hand/knee crawl.

Clear the floors

It's official, Emma is a forward mover!  She does more of an army crawl right now, but she sure is getting around!  It is fun to watch her get to places she has never been before and she is keeping me on my toes for sure!  What fun!

8 Months

Last week Emma turned 8 months old.  I say this every month but she is growing so fast!  Hm...what is new this month.  She now has 6 teeth, is pushing up onto her knees (no progress forward, just straight back down), and is just interacting more and more.  So fun.  Two days ago I went to get her from her nap and she was sitting up!  We will see if she figures out how to do it again.  And, as you can see, she is a great help with folding laundry! 

A Full Weekend

This weekend was packed with fun!  Matt got off Friday for the Comal County Fair, so we went to the parade in the morning and then the fair that night.  Emma loved the animals! Saturday started the project of taking apart the kitchen and re-staining all of the cabinets.  It was a lot of work and really messy, but it is looking so great!  Thanks to Jens parents for coming and helping.  We still have more work to do, but it is coming along.  Emma did great just playing outside a 

lot and taking long naps so that we could work

 hard.  Here are a few pics from the fair.

Week at the Lake

We just got back from a whole week at the lake house!  It was such a great week of playing and relaxing.  While we were there we celebrated four years of marriage, and Emma got in her fourth tooth!  We did swimming, boat rides, got some play time in with Pops and Susu, and made a lot of fun meals.  Emma also learned her love for dogs... looks like we will have to get a puppy?!?

Here are just a few pics from the week.

Happy Anniversary!

This past week we celebrated 4 great years of marriage!  It is so hard to believe that we have been married for that long.  They have been some great years.  We have grown so much and experienced a lot. We cannot wait to see what happens in the next four!  

To my husband: I love you more than I did the day we married, thank you for being a wonderful man!

Johnny Jumper

Emma loves her jumper!  When we put her in, the jumping does not stop.  Earlier today she was going straight for about 40 minutes.  It is too cute.  Sorry, not the best video but you can get the point.

Creative Minds??

The Wallers are in need of some creativity.  This is a really fun chest that we have had sitting in our garage and cannot think of what to do with it...  So, we are open for suggestions.  We used to keep magazines in it, but they curl up and we do not really like that.  

Bring on the ideas!

Summer Nights

Being in Camping Ministry, our summers are pretty crazy.  Matt usually does not get home until pretty late at night, so Jen has picked up a new hobby: sewing.  It seems there are so many fun things to make for Emma.  So, my first project came when I found this online.  My birds are done and now all I have to do is put it all together. 

These turned out so so cute, our little nephews look adorable in them!
These are some little bags that I made for my sister.  They are an Amy Butler pattern, I really like her stuff.  They turned out a lot better than I thought they would and definitely took up plenty of time working on them.
So, that is what Jen has been up to till all hours of the night.  I have some other cute things in the works but I can't share them yet... 

Always look around

Well.  Emma had been showing great signs of another tooth coming on this past week.  So, as the great mom that I thought I was, I put that Orajel along those top gums and daily I would feel to check if anything was coming through.  So, today as we were eating some yummy apples for breakfast I notice that she no longer had two teeth on the bottom, but three!  Who knew, I never even thought to look at the bottom, isn't it the rule that once they get two on the bottom next comes the top?!?  So... Emma now has three on the bottom and is much happier today as it has finally broken through!

6 Months

Emma turned 6 months old this week.  We had her 6 month check up and Emma is 27.5 inches long and weighs 18.5 lbs.  The time has really flown by, it is so hard to believe that she is half a year old already.  She is just growing so fast and just as fun as ever.  

Some new things in the last month:

-mastered the roll from back to front and has an occasional roll from front to back, still working on  that though

-she is loving her sweet potatoes and carrots

-sitting, of course it does not last too long before she is on her face

-she loves playing peek-a-boo

and

-she has her two bottom teeth in

Emma's new face

We do not know where this came from, but this is Emma's new face she makes all the time.  It is so funny, she gets really excited and squints those eyes so hard.  Its so fun to see her discover new things everyday.  

Happy Birthday Matt!!

We have started the birthday celebrations already, it has been a week of fun, but tomorrow is officially Matt's birthday!  I am so blessed to be able to celebrate another year with an amazing husband, my best friend, and now I can say a loving father!  Matt, thanks for all you do for this family, I could not ask for a more devoted and godly man to spend my life with.  As a tribute to Matt, I thought I would share some pictures from a few past birthdays and some of my favorite Matt memories!  Enjoy!

The Pink Tutu

Every little girl needs a tutu, so here is Emma enjoying her first of probably many!  

She did not know quite what to think of it, but we had fun taking pictures anyway.

My friend told me about this great place to get fun swimsuits.  I just got mine in the mail, so fun.  I just had to share!  I got this one... 

Time Away

This past weekend Matt surprised me with a night away in Fredericksburg and then we spent the day at Enchanted Rock.  It was great to be just the two of us, and we tried not to talk about Emma too much!  E-Rock was some great adventures.  We got there early in the morning and did some hiking on the trails, we did some bouldering and then we summated the top.  I think our favorite part was the caving; mostly crawl space, dark, and we were the only ones down there.  The temp was around 103, what a great day to spend out in the sun!

Emma had a great time with Jen's parents.  Of course she was excited to see was when we got home!  

Good times were had by all!

Here are a few pictures:

New Arrival

We have a new arrival in the Waller house, Emma's first tooth!  This morning Matt went in to say good bye and he saw a little tooth sticking out!  So amazing how things happen everyday when they are this age.  She does not seem to be too bothered by it all, we will see if that continues.  Emma had just spent the weekend with Gigi and Paka, we are glad she waited till we got back to show her new tooth.  More on our fun weekend trip coming soon...

1st Fathers Day

What a Dad!

Happy Fathers Day Matt, we love you!!

Plants and Flowers!

We went to work!  Matt had Monday off and so we took advantage.  It was so fun to work ALL day in the yard.  We added some plants to a much needed empty flower bed and then made some new additions to the backyard.  It looks so good and we are really excited about it.  Some plants were given to us by our neighbors and then we used the mulch from our compost we have been making, so fun!  Now all we have to do is water them and keep them alive in this summer heat.  Here are some fun pictures:

This bed was totally empty when we started (besides the bush in the middle, it got to stay).

We added this in the back, its our butterfly garden.

We made this bed around the tree, thanks Matt and Susan for the plants!

Emma's new trick

I have been trying to get a video of Emma's newest trick she is just so cute and so proud!  This is the best one that I could get so far.

And it begins!

Hmmm... what to share for our first post:

Let's start with the most obvious, Emma.  She is just so big and as precious as ever.  She is 4 months old and growing so much.  

Matt is in the second week of summer.  It is hard long days, but so good.  He feels blessed and is excited to see what the Lord does this summer.

Jen is loving being at home with Emma.  Our days are spent playing and working around our new house.  Jen has picked up sewing, mainly cute things for Emma.

And that is our life right now... here are a few pictures.

Emma loves swimming: Thanks to the Thompsons for Sunday swim days!

Our first trip to San Antonio since we moved back to Texas.