Labor Day at the Cabin!

Every Memorial Day and Labor Day, the family heads up to the cabin in Sutton. Originally, my great grandparents homesteaded on land right past Sutton. My grandmother and one of my great uncles also ended up building homes there. Since, only my great uncle's wife remains on the property full time. BUT....when my grandmother sold her home about 7 years ago, she kept around 5 of the "back" acres. Our family friend, Dan, and my uncle, John, built a small cabin on that property, overlooking a large "pond", which now houses what we call the beaver "condo". It's much to large just to be just a beaver dam! Spending time up at the cabin has become somewhat of a regular tradition Memorial Day-to kick off the summer-and Labor Day-to say farewell to summer! Now that Dakota and the twins are old enough, they enjoy going 4wheeling. This spring, my parents bought the boys a gas powered 4 wheeler, and although the power is still a bit too much for the twins, Dakota has been practicing on it quite a bit! Brayden was introduced to the cabin this year Labor Day weekend. We didn't camp out (I don't think everyone else wanted to wake up to a crying baby!), but spent the day there. Brayden quickly found his "spot".....too cute. He loves the hanging chair, and slept amazingly well that afternoon!

Best brother buddies

Daktoa has been so great with Brayden....sometimes a bit too eager to help! But I suppose that's better than the alternative! Dakota is constantly wanting to be with Brayden, giving him kisses and hugs, and helping me out by retrieving spitty cloths, throwing away diapers, and putting Brayden's clothes away. It's been such a blessing having 2 amazing boys.

The "Oberg" Girls...my wonderful cousins!

In August, two of my cousins flew up to Alaska to visit the family for a week. I hadn't seen Tina or Heather in YEARS, and it was so nice to catch up! One afternoon, they came in from Palmer (where the rest of the family is!), went biking on the coastal trail, did a bit of shopping, and then we all went out to dinner at the Sourdough Mining Company. George had the evening off, so he was able to come also! Lucky guy....dinner with 6 beautiful women! I so wish the girls could get together more often! Love you!!

Brayden's first bath

So I skipped ahead a little posting the family pictures. Brayden's bellybutton "fell off" right before we went to North Pole for 4th of July, so we were able to give him his first real bath! He was so cute....he loved it! He is a complete water baby-now that he's just a bit older, we take him with us to go swimming at the Alaska Club, and he is in love with the jacuzzi. George or I will take him in the jacuzzi, and he's passed out within about 5 minutes. And then he sleeps AMAZING that night! So, I've determined that jacuzzi=baby drugs! I can't wait until he's big enough to start hanging out in the big pool....it's still very cold for him! Anyways, here is a few pictures of his first bath!

Family Pictures

SO For 4th of July this year, we went up to North Pole again. #1-We went to spend a little time with George's parents (and so they could spend time with the new addition, Brayden). Lizzie and Alan also went up this year again, and so we all went up to Skip and Olga's cabin at Harding Lake. Also, one of Lizzie's friends from High School, Annie, is a start up photographer, and since our friend Shannon wasn't able to make it up to Alaska for Brayden's birth :( we had Annie take a few family pictures! We all went out to Creamer's Field, so we had cute backdrops of the field, the old barn, etc. It was so funny, because Luke was so unhappy, that the only smile we could get out of him was to get George to throw him up in the air, hand him off to Alan really quick and try to capture a smile before they did it all over again! It was a fun (and hot!) afternoon!!

After Brayden...

So about 10 days after Brayden was born, we drove up to North Pole and spent 5 days there visiting family and friends. Lizzie, Alan, and the boys also went up, and we had an incredible 4th of July weekend (for the 2nd year in a row!). We took the kids to Ice Age in 3-D (which was amazing, by the way), spent time at Lizzie's parents cabin on Harding Lake, had a Cook family picnic at Pioneer Park (it'll always be Alaskaland to me!), and had a barbecue at George's parents place. We spent plenty of time in the sun, and was a fairly relaxing few days, especially after the birth of our little man. The only problems that arose was that Brayden slept in our room, so it was hard to let him cry himself to sleep, and he was also having trouble breastfeeding, so I got to drive into North Pole to buy a can of formula at Carrs/Safeway at 3 in the morning! Oh, and Dakota experienced his first real encounter with wasps! We got to Harding Lake before virtually anyone else (only Skip and one of the grandsons were there), so Koda decided he wanted to go play on the swingset on the beach. A couple minutes later, we hear a blood-curdling scream! He was stung by 7 wasps, and screamed at the top of his lungs for about a half hour! However, he wasn't reluctant at all to go play on the swingset after the whole ordeal!Other than that, we had a blast!

Baby Brayden is here

So my last post was a bit of a very late update, and since much has happened since the Disneyland trip, I'm going to skip it since I know I'll never catch up! So the evening of my last post, the 17th of June, I went into labor with Brayden. George and I went into the hospital about 3am on June 18th, and eventually had him that night, at 8:20pm. Brayden George was 7 lbs, 9 oz and 19.75 inches long! He was absolutely georgeous, and AWAKE for a few hours, so family could actually see him alert that evening! He did have a bit of a lumpy head (which was George's first comment as he was born!), but not a hint of "squish" on his face, which I was excited about! We left the hospital the next late afternoon. Dakota was so excited he got to be at the hospital right after his little brother was born, and is the best big brother. He helps with pretty much everything except the actual changing of a diaper! Brayden is such a joy to be around, and he's such a good baby. He sleeps well, is a pretty calm baby, and is just now starting to smile more. More updates to come!