28!

So our conversation went something like this:

A couple weeks before my birthday...

Steph: I just want to go down to Portland for a weekend, do some shopping and get my hair done for my birthday.

Kev: So I don't need to do anything?

Steph: Nope.

The night before my birthday...

Steph:Do you know what so and so got for their birthday? And what her husband did for her on her birthday? :)

Kev: I thought you wanted to go down to Portland and pick out your own gifts?

Steph: I do. I am just saying I like surprises too.

Kev: I think you may be disappointed tomorrow.

Birthday...



Not at all disappointed! It was a wonderful day. I love my Kevin.

Zac Zac

Our little Z is such a sweetie! We just love him so much. He really is such a great baby. A cuddle boy too, loves to sleep on your chest.

He really has been through alot already in his short two months. We visit the doctors office weekly for weight checks. The ENT wants to monitor his growth closely because babies with severe floppy epiglottis' will often choose breathing over eating. Luckily that hasn't been the case for Zac yet. The ENT says he can't believe how well he eats for how awful he sounds.

This last week has been hard though because he caught the twins' cold and has a cough. So breathing problems plus congestion from a cold makes life even harder for the boy. He will eat and then cough so hard that he throws it all up. Not fun! We are hoping the cough will soon leave.

When I go places I get lots of looks of concern when they hear Zac. The nurse at my OB office said "Oh he is singing!" Lots of people will say, "How cute he is snoring".

But it breaks my heart to know he is working so hard to breathe. We really hope he doesn't have to do the procedure and that he can grow out of it. 85 percent of babies do.

He has started smiling and cooing and we just think he is the cutest.

Best Friends

I am so glad that Ty and Gracie have each other. With the demands of a newborn and not being able to go outside due to the rainy weather it is so nice they have each other to play with. And of course fight with too :)

They are my little mess makers, every room of the house is constantly being "re-decorated" by my little tots. Kevin says they take advantage of the fact that I am not going to run after them when I am feeding Zac. Oh the naughtiness! Time-out has been used often.

They turned two and I feel like instantly they started acting two. Where did my sweet babies go? To toddlerhood that is where. They get very upset when something doesn't go their way or the other one has what they want. And they know how to push each other's buttons too. But they also love each other more than anyone else. And they know how to comfort each other when the other one is sad.

A couple weeks ago when they were sitting on the floor watching their favorite Toy Story Ty put is arm around Gracie and they sat just like that, side to side with his arm around her. The sweetest thing! I was feeding Zac of course and the camera was not within reach.

Their nursery leaders always tell me how neat it is to watch them in nursery because they are so connected. They look out for each other and are truly best friends.





















I love my twinners!

"I'm Two"!

A few days before their birthday I got Ty and Gracie to say "I'm two"! That they are! We had a blast celebrating their special day.

With a new baby in the house I decided not to do a big party. But the Friday before, we were lucky to have our friends the Kays and Halversons over for a birthday dinner. They spoiled them with lots of gifts and attention! It was a great way to kick off their birthday.

Kev took their birthday off and we had a fun family day together.
We started the day with their two year doctor appt. I know not exactly the way most would like to spend their birthdays maybe that's why they looked like this when we got them up....


I think they knew we were headed for the doctors office.


After their check-up we went to this great place called Jump where there are tons for the kids to do. They enjoyed this little section with toys to play with.


Had to slip in a picture of cute little Zac!


Ty enjoyed all the room to run and throw balls the most!


Gracie has no fear, her favorite was going down the enormous slide.


The year of the tricycle! Ty got a Cars trike.


And Gracie got a Tinkerbell trike. They are a little short for them but I think will be perfect for them in the summer.


Watch out! Here comes Bad to the Bone Biker Ty! Of course not without his paci!


Present time! They have been way into Toy Story lately and were so excited to get their own Jesse and Woody action figures.


Ty loves his Woody, if only his hat would stay on.


Gracie loves her pajamas and especially loved getting new ones from Grandma F.


Clothes! Yay for Grandma getting them adorable new clothes.


It is especially what Ty needed! Thank you so much!


We had a yummy ice cream cake when we did their birthday dinner. So today was all cupcakes! Which is just perfect for them.


Ty was so excited to blow out his candles.


We had to sing to him a couple times.


Gracie's turn! She was an expert at blowing out her candles.

See we ended the day with big smiles! Happy Birthday to my Gracie and Ty!

Thank you to all our friends and family who sent cards and birthday wishes, you helped make their second birthday very memorable!

Zac at one month

How can it be? One month old already! It has gone even faster than I could imagine, I knew it would. It was quite the first month for my little guy.

He had his one month check this morning and did very well. He was alert and didn't seem to mind the doctor poking around. However, he didn't like the PKU blood draw. It always makes me sad when they have to squeeze his foot.

Weight 8 lbs. 3 oz.
Still seems little, but remember he started at 5.14 so this is a HUGE weight gain for one month. He is a great eater.

Length 21 inches
He is my long and lean baby, similar to how I was. Not to mention he has my hands and feet. Kev keeps saying he is my little boy.

Our little Z has spent the month catching some z's as Kevin likes to say and eating of course. He likes to eat at least every 3 hours and usually cluster feeds right before bed. And of course he wakes me up throughout the night to eat as well. He doesn't seem to mind his baths, but likes to be clothed otherwise. He doesn't care to take the pacifier yet, but didn't seem to mind the bottle when Kev fed it to him.
Ty and Gracie adore him and continually say "baby Zac". Ty likes to take off his socks and touch his face. And Gracie is mommy's helper. Zac seems to like them as well.

We love Zac so much and are so happy to have him in our family. We feel so blessed. It has been a roller coaster of a month, but really are so grateful.

Feeling Needy

Before I had Zac I had numerous conversations with people who would tell me how much help I was going to need after having him. I guess having three children under the age of 2 with a C-section on top of that seemed like a bit much. This I understood but at the same time I have a hard time asking for help unless its from Kevin or my mom. I just figure if I want something done, I will do it myself. With a C-section recovery you really have to allow yourself to heal and this just takes time. It is especially hard for me to not be able to take care of Ty and Gracie and not lift them. They're still my babies.

Well, my first couple weeks I really tried to recover, catch up on sleep and let things be. Even if it was torture for me on the inside to be so limited. So I thought I was accepting my "help" well and strengthing that weakness of mine. I guess I have some more to learn.

Last Tuesday Kev took Zac to Urgent Care because we thought his normally loud, squeaky breathing sounded worse and he was contracting into his lungs. I was at home with the twinners. An hour later Kev called and said they wanted to transport him to the Childrens Hospital immediately. He told me to get someone to watch the twins and meet him there. Seriously! After losing it on the phone, I tried to pull myself together for Ty and Gracie. It didn't work since Ty saw me cry and he started crying and grabbed my hand and didn't want to leave my side. My awesome friend Courtney came and got the twins and I was off to the hospital.

By the time I got there, they had just left the ER and taken Zac up to the ICU. They escorted me to his room and there was my poor little baby hooked up to monitors, being poked and prodded, IV in his arm. Now I really lost it.

For the next 36 hours, they had to draw blood, monitor him, put on a breathing mask, give him antibiotics, and the worst part was he couldn't eat. They were trying to rule out anything viral before they did anything evasive. Which meant waiting for test results to come back. Waiting in the ICU is a very slow wait, especially while listening to your son cry, knowing he wants fed, and being able to do nothing about it. Yep, I was in my own personal hell.

The first night was the worst, they had to redo his IV and it
took an hour and half for them to get another one to work. I really have never felt so helpless. The twins were also sick at home with colds and coughs. I didn't see them for 48 hours. And then we got hit with a huge snow storm, causing problems for Kevin's mom who was flying in to watch the twins.

I didn't make phone calls because everytime I talked on the phone in those first two days I just fell apart. Therefore, I sent out texts. And I really appreciate those who sent their love, support and help through text. It meant alot knowing people wanted to help.

There is tons I could write on our stay in the ICU but I'll continue to add more later. Once we got the viral test results back which were negative, they planned to do a bronch test. So on Thursday they sedated Zac so he was out and put a tiny tube down his throat with a camera to take pictures. And that gave us the answer we needed. He has a condition called Laryngomalasia where his epiglottis is floppy, causing his airway to be small, hence why it sounds like he is gasping for air.
In most cases infants grow out of this within the first year, in some cases they opt to do a laser procedure to harden up the tissue and allow for more air. Of course the ENT is out of town and we wont meet with him for a couple weeks. It will be up to the ENT on what he suggests we do for Zac.

Therefore, we were discharged on Friday and got to go home. Yay! So my little Zac sounds the same, very noisy, wheezy, and squeaky but it could have been much worse. The ICU is not a happy place and I feel very blessed to have left with my Zac in our arms.

So I have felt very needy this month of February but am so grateful for friends and family who have been so willing to help me and my family. Thank you!

I decided not to take pictures of him hooked up to everything. But here he is on Friday before we left with Daddy in the rocking chair we were able to use.

And then we became a party of Five!

We had a scheduled C-section for February 10th. I was hoping to maybe get the chance to do a v-bac but that was only if I went into labor before the 10th. As of my last Drs. appt I wasn't dialated at all and it didn't look like I would go into labor. I was settling into the 10th being our day. However, as always life doesn't always happen as planned. Last Friday I started leaking amniotic fluid and wasn't sure at the time if that is really what it was. Therefore we took our time going into the hospital to get checked. One, my doctor was still out of town and two I just wasn't quite ready in case it really meant having the baby. We waited until Saturday morning and I was still leaking so we decided to go in. We dropped the twins off at our friends and were on our way. They checked me and sure enough I had a rupture in my water. Our little guy was coming out! I wasn't in labor so I had to have a C-section. They prepped me and got me back to the OR and very shortly our baby was born.
This is my 38 week picture.


Introducing our newest little bundle of joy:

Zac Christopher Jenkins

Born: February 5th at 1:28 pm via C-section

Weighed 5 lbs. 14 oz.

Length: 19 inches



I couldn't believe how small he was! I was expecting him to be closer to 7 pounds. Ty was much bigger than him and he was a twin and three weeks early!


He looked great though, had great color and sounded good. We were so happy to have a healthy little boy!


Proud Papa!


We had to get his temperature up before he could take a bath. So he took his bath at 1 in the morning. He kept sliding down on the nurse.


Auntie came to visit right after he was born. We're so glad she came and saw Zac and helped me at the hospital.


Our first night home from the hospital he did so well! I hope he continues to be such an easygoing baby.


He is quite the alert little guy.


Oh we just love him so much!


Welcome to our family Zac! Thanks for making us a party of five!