Baby Name!

Well we've picked out a baby name! Billy said he wouldn't discuss names until after I found out the gender, so literally like the day after I saw my nursery and the gender of the baby - we discussed names again and finally decided on one. YAY!

Billy always laughs because I have to "lead up" to what the name is - because, well it's not your typical name you hear every day and some people - about half of who we tell, don't like it.
But you know what? It's our kid...not theirs. ;) haha

Anyway, I liked Noah and Isaac and Andrew and Quinn/Quinlan - but none of them felt "right". They were great names...just not THE name.

I was so happy then when Billy agreed on the name that I DID love and felt was THE name.

So his name will be Kaenan Guy B....
(Like Keenan, but with a long "a" instead of the long "e")

The spelling was an issue at first, deciding which way to go. I originally found the name Canaan because it's biblical, however many many people mispronounced it as "Cannon". So then I found another form of the name, also in the Bible - Cainan. However Billy thought it might have referenced to Cain too much and we didn't want to name our son after the Cain in the Bible. !!

That led us to the Irish spelling, Kaenan. We like to pick Irish/Celtic names anyway (Owen and Brayden were supposed to be Irish/Celtic in origin, but it depends on which baby name book you look in!).
So I let Billy then pick the spelling since I picked the name.

And for those who don't like it - well you'll get used to it. I am already calling him by his name and can imagine him with this name totally...for others, once you get to know him -in time you won't be able to imagine him with any other name as well.

Santa came! ...Christmas 2008

Well Santa came, the kids are happy and full of sugar and excitement. It still hasn't quite worn off yet and it's now early evening, Christmas Day.

I have tons of pictures to share and not much to add other then just comments on the photos! It's been a long couple days and I'm too tired to type much more then just photo comments.

OH yeah and of course...those waiting/wanting to see my big Christmas gift - my surprise nursery that revealed the gender of baby #5...well just wait until the end to see. ;) haha
Baby Billy - first one up the stairs. It was 5:30am and he had a rough night. He's got a new cold in his eyes and nose, and so he looks pretty miserable and tired here.

Daddy showing baby Billy his Santa gifts...trying to get him into the spirit!

Owen was next up the stairs...being goofy as usual even in the wee hours of the morning. Here he's giving us the "stink eye" as Billy like to call that face. haha

Brayden is next...I cropped the picture because he likes to sleep in his undies. haha I think the camera and all the people watching him really made him shy because he never looked at the piano until a few minutes after he got up the stairs! I don't know if he didn't notice it or he was too shy to make a show about it. haha He LOVES it though and after watching me play "Mary Had a Little Lamb" he started to practice and play it all on his own. Then Auntie showed him how to play the chorus of "The First Noel" and he practiced that for hours and plays it fairly well already!

Owen playing with his Santa gift, a Handy Manny transforming truck.


Alex very happy with his Santa gift, a guitar! He's already tried a few "lessons" on his DVD that came with it. He seems to really like it!

Baby Billy likes the piano too. We can't keep him off of it!

Brayden trying out his new bike, which was an optional Santa present if we couldn't find the piano, but since we did - then the bike became and under the tree gift from mom and dad. We didn't want to wrap it though, so Billy wrapped a letter that said to look outside of the front door...and there was the bike!

Owen opening a present - he seems...shocked, excited, appalled?

Oh! It's the Star Wars clone trooper helmet he wanted so badly!!

Baby Billy's own piano! It even comes with a microphone. Here Auntie is showing him how to sing! ;)


OKAY It's NURSERY PHOTO TIME!!!!!!!!!!

A super special thanks to Billy for helping get all of this together, and especially to my mom and sister who spent all day painting these awesome murals. I definitely did not get any of my mom's artistic talents! Thanks mom!!!!! (and Candace!)
OH and I'm supposed to add that the room isn't entirely done. The big mural of the watering hole, the lion isn't quite done. And there is a framed print of one of my favorite photos/paintings that is still in the mail...it's the "First Kiss" of the mom giraffe kissing her new baby on the head. I love that painting. :) I'll take a picture when we get it!

Wall one:

The new crib:

The dresser by the crib, and displaying the framed ultrasound photos....can you see the gender yet? Keep looking...

A mural on another wall:

A close-up of the tiger mural:

And finally....a close-up of the gender revealing ultrasound...


Can you tell what it is? It's circled and written on there, but it's also been folded up in Billy's pocket for a month now so it's pretty creased and wrinkled. haha It's pretty obvious though...no doubting those BOY parts!
Yep so it's BOY number FIVE for us! I suspected it all along, mostly just because that's what we're seem to meant to have. I'm happy, I know boys...girls are the unknown for me! Although the thought of five teenage boys is pretty scary....

So that's that! Just a few more weeks to go to meet him! YAY!

Owen the Christmas Cow

Last night was the church Christmas dinner and program. Owen was asked to dress up as a nativity animal.

I don't sew and I'm not crafty.

So naturally I spent the week obsessing over other costumes I found online and trying to find the easiest one to do. I decided on a cow, because gluing tons of pieces of cotton for a sheep didn't sound like fun. haha
However, Owen wanted to be a camel. He insisted on being a camel. I considered it momentarily, and even looked for a few camel costume ideas online. However it proved to be way beyond my expertise.
So he was a cow.

I wanted him to be a white cow with brown or black spots, but I couldn't find a white hooded sweatshirt/sweatpants. Only black. So he was a black cow with white spots...not sure if those exist, but maybe special Christmas cows can be black with white spots. :)
I ended up sewing the white spots on with my limited knowledge of sewing that I remembered from high school. I also sewed on the ears and the "mane" for the cow.

Owen really liked it and his favorite part was the tail. haha

It ended up being way too much work (2-3 days!) for just the short 15 minutes he was on stage, but it was cute and made for good memories.

Here are the pix of Owen the Christmas cow and a few others I forgot to add last week of Owen's preschool Christmas concert.

Front view:
Back view:


Owen's big debut:

Owen's preschool concert:
(I had to leave the boy in the photo next to him, the poor thing was so cute but so sad looking. He cried through most of the concert)

Nine years of Christmas

Being nostalgic tonight, I decided that it'd be a good idea to share my favorite Christmas photos from all of the years I've had children of my own.
It was fun just going through all of my pictures and seeing how the boys grew each year and how our family kept growing.
I hope you all have as much fun as I did looking at these past pictures!

~Bethany

Christmas 1999
No digital camera yet, so forgive the grainy scanned in photos. I was still a young single mom at this time, in addition to the following year. It was 2001 when Billy and I had our first Christmas together as a new family (we were married by then too).
In these photos, Alex was 10 months old.

Christmas 2000
The second year that I was still a single mom. Alex was 22 months old. I didn't have any other Christmas photos this year (that I could find) other then these two photos that were taken at Walmart:

Christmas 2001
The first Christmas that Billy and I were married and spending together as a family with Alex. Alex was almost 3 years old (his birthday being in February) and I was pregnant with Brayden at the time, due the day before Alex's 3rd birthday! (He ended up being born 2 days after Alex's birthday thankfully!)

Christmas 2002
This year Brayden was now a member of our family, he was 10 months old and Alex was almost 4 years old.

Papa John played Santa this year! It was a lot of fun!

Christmas 2003
This year Alex was almost 5, Brayden almost 2 and Owen was growing in my tummy! His birthday is in April, so he had a ways to go still before he would join us.

Great Grandpa Ernie reading Twas the Night Before Christmas, our Christmas Eve tradition.

Brayden checking out his new shopping cart, which he thought was TOTALLY cool.

Alex digging his first big boy bike!
Christmas 2004
Another new member of our family! Owen was now 8 months old, and Alex was almost 6, Brayden almost 3.

Their first Santa picture! We loved this Santa and missed him when he left. :(

All of the boys posing together - can you believe Brayden's long hair?!

Owen's cutie patootie Christmas outfit. The shirt says "Santa's Little Helper"
Christmas 2005
This Christmas Alex was almost 7, Brayden almost 4 and Owen was 1.5 years old. We also had another new member of our family! But not a two-legged member....a fuzzy black four-legged one! We had a bright idea to surprise my grandpa Ernie (see Christmas 2003) with a puppy for Christmas. Well we chickened out but still had the puppy, so we decided to keep him.
Sadly, we didn't realize it at the time but the puppy who we named Merlin, had a serious birth defect. He lived a year before we had to have him put down. :(

Merlin - 2005-2006
The boys Santa photo with the Santa we loved again!
Owen's turn to put the tree topper on!

Christmas 2006
This Christmas Alex was almost 8, Brayden almost 5, and Owen 2.5 years old. Yet again, we had a new member of our family in the oven (well not literally!). Baby Billy was busy growing in momma's tummy. And he also had a February birthdate, so he was just a couple months away from joining us!

Okay FIRST I have the share my terrible Santa photo. This was the first year that our favorite Santa was no longer working at the mall. We missed him, but thought we'd give the new Santa a try. As you can tell, it didn't go so well. Besides the horrible photo quality (I didn't touch this up at all so that you could see how the photo was in its original state!), and the weird look on Brayden's face....Santa himself looked very angry. I don't think he was having a good year. Perhaps Mrs. Claus was giving him a hard time. As you can also tell, Owen is missing from the picture. He refused to sit on new Santa's lap.
This was the last year we went to the mall for a Santa photo needless to say.
(To see the angry glare from Santa...click on the picture to see it full size)

SO I took my own family photo to send out with Christmas cards, the first year I started taking the boys' photos for Christmas. (The first of many since we have since boycotted the mall Santa haha)
Alex on Christmas morning, giving us a thumbs up. I guess he liked his gift!
Owen also liked his gift. Here he is dancing with Barney!
Christmas 2007
Big year! This year we added TWO new members to our family! Baby Billy was now 10 months old and we decided to try it again with a four-legged furry friend. I had to talk (big) Billy into it, but after he saw her he couldn't resist anyway. She was supposed to be a Christmas morning surprise for the boys, but he couldn't wait so he brought her home as soon as he saw her at the animal shelter. She was part of an abandoned litter. The sweetest little thing too!
We named her Lady, and she's healthy and still very much a part of our family.
Okay so this year, Alex was almost 9, Brayden almost 6, Owen 3.5 and baby Billy 10 months.

"Lady" at 8 weeks old.
Our family (minus mom and dad) Christmas picture

Brayden helping decorate the tree:

Christmas 2008...
Pictures to come! And yet again, a new member of our family soon to join us in the new year. Most likely another February birthday too! haha
But no more four-legged friends. Three cats, two geckos and a dog is plenty!