And She is 3

typical family picture and it is beautiful!

birthday presents

intently looking at mommy open the box to get the tea set out

her face says it all

yum I get to drink tea and have tea parties now!

So our little girl is 3 years old now!  Wow, time has flown by so very quickly.  I still remember so very clearly the day Kenzie was placed in my arms for the first time.  I remember how happy and content I was, and how sad I was at the same time.  My sorrow was for the woman who gave birth to Kenzie and then placed her in our arms.  I could not being to understand the heart ache she was feeling so my tears flowed freely for her and my heart broke for her, and at the same time my heart was leaping for great joy that my daughter was in my arms.  I put her in a sleeper we had bought and washed the night before and we took Kenzie to my mom's home to celebrate Christmas with my family before we brought her home to stay.

I was surprised by how natural it felt to be a mom.  I was surprised by the intensity of my fierce mommy drive to protect, love, and nurture this fragile tiny little girl who had enveloped my whole being and I knew she nor I would ever let go of each other!  Hands down the Christmas we brought her home 3 years ago was the best Christmas we have ever had or I can imagine us ever having (last Christmas finding out I was pregnant with Hayden is a close 2nd though).

We careful chose Kenzie's name - MacKenzie Joy Krahn.  We named her after a woman who was a significant part of my life at the time.  A woman who journeyed with us as we walked the adoption road.  Kenzie being named after her is a reminder to me of all the good things I want to remember from that relationship.  MacKenzie means radiant, and born of fire.  Joy means joyful one. So Kenzie's name means radiant, born of fire, joyful one.  I cannot imagine a more suitable name for our little girl than that.

So what did we do this year to celebrate 3 amazing years?  Well we had family and one close friend over to celebrate with us.  My mom made a Strawberry Short Cake, cake for Kenzie and the majority of the gifts revolved around that theme.  Then on her actual birthday we had a friend come over and the above photo's (thanks Megan), had lunch with my friend, and then we drove to Kamloops for dinner, a short visit with Grandma J., and took a walk around the Kamloops Wild Life Park enjoying the Wild Lights (they set up lights every year at Christmas).  The highlight of the day for me as her mom was hearing her ask everyone she met for birthday cake that day!  She was sure that she had to have cake everywhere we went and was not shy about asking for it!  Okay I take it back my true highlight of the day was Kenzie calling me her hero that morning!  I love being her hero!

Well I think I am going to try to sneak an hour of sleep in before the kids wake up and we let them open presents, seeing as we are celebrating Jesus birthday today.

Merry Christmas

Wow it is early Christmas morning!  And I am wide awake.  Writing the post may come back to bite me later today when I am super tired and we have family here!  I guess I can always sneak off to feed Hayden and then snuggle with him and sleep a bit!

Why is it that with little kids trying to get a great family photo just does not happen!  Okay I should say a nice orderly photo does not happen because looking at this, it is a great and totally accurate photo of what life is like for us!

We opted not to send out a Christmas letter this year as we just sent out Hayden's birth announcements in the fall, so my Christmas letter will be found here.

Our family hopes that this year has been an amazing year for all who read this and for those who do not as well.  While we know that life has it's ups and downs I truly hope that when we all look back on the past year we are all able to see some of the wonders of God in our lives.

So it was a year ago that we got an early Christmas gift from God in the form of finding out we were pregnant, and in August we welcomed Hayden Ezra Krahn into the family!  While life with three children age 3 and under is often crazy we cannot envision a life without our not so little baby boy.  Hayden is by far the most laid back of the three kids ( I could handle having one more baby if we had another baby like Hayden, and Kenzie has been asking for a baby sister lately).

This year also brought us to a place of reaching out for help with Jaris.  We are currently waiting for the IHCAN assessment to take place.  We are looking into Autism Spectrum Disorder or Pervasive Developmental Disorder.  In the mean time we are taking Jaris to speech therapy every few months until he is off the wait list and gets to go more frequently, and we are waiting to get into OT.  Jeral and I also sought out the help of a play therapist to help us with helping Jaris regulate his emotions a little better.  While we know we have a long way to go we also are seeing him thrive and progress.  He truly is a gift to our family.

It is hard to believe that three years has passed since Kenzie was placed in our arms, and totally captured our hearts!  Okay who are we kidding she had our hearts long before we ever held her.  She is a fireball our little girl, and she loves to talk, run, play, and be mommy's helper.  We love her infectious smile and laughter.  We know our family would just not be complete without her in it!

Life on the farm and having three little ones keeps us very busy.  As the new year comes in we are looking forward to settling more into a routine with three kids.  Trying to find more time for just the two of us!  Oiy that seems to be not something that we find a lot of time to do.  However we are leaving all three kids with some friends for a few hours on our anniversary in a few days.  We have been married for 6 years!

Well I think I need to go snuggle with my daughter so from our family to yours we pray and hope you have a fantastic Christmas and that this coming year is full of love and the desires of you hearts!

Gallstones

So it is official, I have gallstones.  They are small, yet they are there and they are not going away.  Therefore I am meeting with a surgeon in February to discuss options.  In the mean time I need to stay away from certain foods, and if I get an attack that lasts longer than 6 hours I need to go to the ER.  The plan is to avoid an attack all together.  It is a relief knowing what is going on with my body, and now I know that cheating and eating certain foods is not a good idea!

Other than that life is same old same old!  We had our big family Christmas of which 44 out of 50 people were here! It was fun and Jaris surprised us with how great he did with so many people around!  I was so proud of him as a mama!  We are still waiting for the assessment process to begin for him, and yet I am okay with waiting as it gives us more time with the different therapists to help us help Jaris develop and grow!  He is such a blessing and miracle in our lives.  All of our children our!

In the weeks ahead we have Kenzie's 3rd birthday party.  More thoughts on that to come in later posts.  We have a few parties and then we have  Christmas with my mom, sister and her family.  This time of year is always full of adventure and lots of blessings!

Well Hayden had is 3 month check up last week and he is a big boy.  As my doctor put it Hayden at 15 weeks is the same size as an average 8 month old!  Then she said Leanne you have turned into a baby making machine!  I laughed as she said she remembers when I first became her patient and how at one point we both were unsure if I would be able to get pregnant.  Now she is reminding me that breast feeding is not a form of contraception.  Once again I laughed and told her we know and have no intentions of having another one anytime soon if at all.  Three children is a great number and I am so thankful for the three miracles via three journeys we have been granted the privilege of loving, nurturing, caring for, providing for, and guiding through this life.

So the kids!!!

Kenzie - is so cute and she knows it!  Tonight when I got home from Kelowna I told her I had bought her birthday presents and had then in a special place.  She asked me to pick her up and then she kissed me and said, "Mommy you home, and you hid my presents in the van right?"  Yes you little smarty pants!  Good thing she did not go running to the van to find them!  The theme is Strawberry Short Cake this year for my soon to be three year old!

Jaris - I quickly made him a weighted blanket and we will see how he likes it.  I am going to take more time to make him one.  I just wanted to do one fast so we could see if it would help.  We also ordered him two weighted stuffed animals.  I sort of want to steal one for me.  Jaris is also starting to talk more.  At least I am understanding more of his jibberish.  At lunch today he looked at me and said, "I have some."  Some is really the only clear word that others would understand.  However I understood to other two words in that sentence.  Jaris has begun multi-tasking, and his idea of multi-tasking is taking my iPhone and Jeral's iPhone and watching a movie on one and playing a game on the other.  When I got home tonight I thought he was running up to me for a hug.  In reality the hug and kisses were offered up solely for the purpose of getting my phone!  Thank you son!  I love you too, and I am not ashamed of trading my phone for hugs and kisses!

Hayden - well like I said he is the size of an average 8 month old!  He is smiling more, cooing more, and laughing more!  I love watching his little personality develop.  I will admit that one of my favorite things is when he is awake and babbling away in the morning and peer over the side of his crib and he hears my voice and sees me and smiles.  That melts my heart.  These are all things Jaris did not do at this age, so seeing Hayden do all these things now and also rolling back to front numerous times puts my worries to rest for the most part.

I have said it before and I will say it again!  My children are often the hardest part of my day, and yet they are the best part of every day!  I never would have fathomed when I married Jeral almost 6 years ago that we would have three children age 2 and under (okay one of them is almost 3).  Yet we do and we have an adventure every day.