FINALLY WE'RE BACK!!!

We are finally going to update everyone!! We have been so busy it has been crazy! We have officially sold our house as of mid- October and we are currently living with my parents and have been since the end of September. It has been such a blessing to stay here and not worry about being homeless. =) Our dream house is almost ours completely!! We close around December 10 and building officially starts. It should be finished by the end of January and we will be in our own house!

Here are some recent picture of my 3 angels playing together...life is so good...God is so amazing!!


Madilyn is almost 5 months old!! She is rolling and 'talking' so much! She loves to make her dinosaur noises when she is trying to shove her whole fist in her mouth! She is officially teething but no teeth have come to the surface. She loves to smile and she is so wonderfully social! She is looking more and more like Feliciti- which we love! Here she is in her sister's princess crown. She loved it!


Feliciti is speaking in full sentences now and so clearly!! She loves to sing and you will find her singing all the time! She just wakes up and starts talking and playing in her bed. She is still our little angel although she is definitely our 'stubborn one'. She loves playing with her baby dolls and she absolutely adores her sister Madilyn!

This is Feliciti doing what she loves best!! When Madilyn starts to cry or fuss, she goes over to make her 'all better'. It is so amazing to see her maternal instincts grow every day!

Fire Chief Feliciti

Mikah is 3 and a half years old already and he is truly just like his Dad! He looks just like him and loves to play! Wrestling has become his favorite as well as chase and hide and seek. He is such a joy to be around! He is learning so much and it is amazing to see him just 'get' things. I can't believe that in just a year and a half, he will be starting school!!!! Honestly, I can't wait for him to come home each day with a new skill or a favorite subject...sigh...


Justin is a full-time stay at home dad and he is really good at it! The kids love having their Daddy home with them and it is so great to see Madilyn grow so close to him! His counseling is going great and he says that it is so amazing to work for something that you truly love for the first time.
I am taking 2 graduate class this semester and I am making an A in both classes! =) I am loving life at my new school and my students are so great! Life gets hectic at times due to our very busy lives but the Lord has been so faithful to us...He sustains us each day...He renews our spirits! Thanks for listening to our update!

Some more pictures for your viewing pleasure

This is Justin in his awesome robes with his degree! We are so proud of him!

This is our favorite thing right now- Madilyn's smiling!!!!!

Mr. Cool! Hopefully he loves soccer as much as his Daddy does!

This is one tired Daddy but also a Daddy madly in love with his daughter!!!

Ziebarth pictures

Look at my beautiful angel and her "Cheese" smile!!!

Look at how strong my Madilyn is! She loves holding herself up like this!

Oh he is so handsome!!! He loves to take pictures just like his mommy!

Her Yaya bought her this outfit and put her hair up like this for church! She was stunning!

This was only 2 weeks ago and already Madilyn looks so different!!

Madilyn is already over 6 weeks old!!

WOW...I truly can't believe that my angel is already 6 weeks old...she has grown so much! I will update some pictures later when I get some time. She is spontaneously smiling all the time and it is absolutely precious! She is stealing our hearts! Mikah and Feliciti love seeing their baby sister smile! They get such a huge kick out of it.

Justin has officially graduated with his Master's of Counseling which is absolutely huge!!! He has worked so hard for the past 3 years and it has paid off! He is now a stay-at-home-dad! =) He loves it and is having a blast with the kids. He says it is so gratifying to be able to spend this much needed time with the kids. He also is counseling twice a week at the church and doing such a great job with that!

That's the update for now...I promise to update pictures today or tomorrow!

On a brighter and beautiful note...

To liven up the blog, I want to include the link to see some precious pictures of my angel Madilyn.

www.picturesofgrace.org
Go to the bottom where it says Full Screen. Then click on Client Proof at the top. The username is Madilyn and the password is mission. Click on the white box in the center of the screen to enter the pictures. They will slideshow through and you can see some great pictures of Madilyn and also some cute surprises of the big brother Mikah. (Feliciti wouldn't get into any pictures.) We are going to go to the Botanical Gardens with this great photographer soon to take family pictures.

By the way, for anyone wanting to take great pictures of their family and wanting to contribute to the Lord's work, look at her Mission. She gives 100% of her charge to a mission of her choice and currently it is for 2 woman from our church going to Kenya for a mission trip. She is a Godly woman wanting to make a difference for His Name!! And she takes great pictures!!!

Up and Down and Up and Down

We have experienced more ups and downs the past couple of weeks than we ever thought possible...

We were blessed with our enchanting Madilyn who has been such an amazing baby...the Lord truly outdid Himself with her...

Mikah and Feliciti (although both experiencing bouts of toddlerhood/three-year-hood) are truly in love with Madilyn and have not had sibling jealousy.

Justin has had off with us all summer and it has been truly amazing to have him home...we have had lots of fun going to Hawaiian Falls, playing at the mall, swimming in the in-laws pool, and making memories with our new family.

These have been our ups...now to the downs...

Our house almost got into contract...yes they bailed. The inspection scared them away with it having too many little things wrong with it. We are devastated...we have been so upset lately...it has affected us too much and we have decided something.....

We are going to keep our house on the market until August 24 which is when school starts and when I go back to school for my Master's a.k.a life gets even crazier for us...then we are going to take the house off the market until next year sometime. We feel peace about this decision and will rely on the Lord until then to hold us up through this.

Please join our family in praying for the Lord's will for our lives. He is faithful to us.

Final House News!!

So we have officially entered into a contract on our house!! We are currently in the 7 day option period to have the inspection etc. So please continue to pray for our house to come out ok with the inspection and also to continue to our August 25 closing date!!! Next comes looking for our dream house!!!

WOOHOO the Lord is so good!!!

More pictures of Madilyn at 4 weeks (tomorrow)

Oh my...how cute is this picture? He is so precious with her...


Tummy time!


She loved looking at the camera during this 'shoot'. She is so photogenic!


Mikah was showing her how to do tummy time.


Kicking those legs! Soccer player or dancer?

Madilyn at 4 weeks old

Here are some updated pictures of my beautiful angel...I am so in love!!

This was Madilyn about to head out...so focused and beautiful.


Doesn't Feliciti look breathtaking? Ahhh...she loves holding her baby sister!


This was Madilyn's first bath- she loved it half the time and hated it the other half! I had to get a picture of my wet ducky!


Look at me! I can hold my head up!

Poop and House News

Love that title! Ok so Mikah pooped in the potty today which is huge!! We didn't even ask him...he just came up to us after we got back from Hawaiian Falls and said "I gotta poopoo in the potty." So off he went and yeah! He is a really big boy now!

Also we have our realtor coming right now to discuss our 3 offers we have received for our house! God is so good and faithful! We are humbled that the Lord is showing Himself in such a HUGE WAY!!! He is so amazing!!!!!!!!

Life gets stressful sometimes...

We have been battling some major stress lately...and believe or not, it does not come from having a 3 week old!! It comes from us selling our house...yes you heard me, we are trying to sell our house in today's market and it is not going well.

You can understand why we are trying to get out of our house when you close your eyes and think of the following scenario: Mikah our 3 year old comes out of his room which he shares with his 2 year old sister Feliciti...he tells us that she is bothering him and that he wants to be by himself. Well in our 1200 square foot house, there are not many places that he can go to be alone. So he is just irritated...5 minutes later they start screaming at each other while they are playing with trucks and Madilyn is just down the very short hallway hopefully getting used to this loudness that is her life! My scenario isn't over but I am starting to get a headache! AGAIN!

So back to our stress...the house has been very close to a contract this past week and it fell through...this is one of the most devastating things we have encountered lately...WE MUST HAVE MORE ROOM!!! We have been praying our hearts out and seeking the Lord's will. He has never closed a door during this process so we are hopeful...if you are reading this right now, please have mercy on us and send up a prayer that we can get our house sold soon!

2 week Dr. Appointment

We took Madilyn yesterday to her 2 week appointment. We had a bet going that she was close to 9 pounds but..................she is 8 pounds and 5 ounces. The doctor was ok with the small weight gain because as long as she is over her birth weight, we are doing good. She has grown a lot though!! She is 21 and a half inches long- she's grown an inch and a half since birth!!! My tall girl!! =)

She is getting a little more fussy in the evening and after feedings sometimes. My new theory is that she gets overwhelmed and tired and we keep her up longer than she should...we expect too much from our 2 week old!! So we are going to be putting her down more...I'll update you on my theory.

Having our family of 5 has been amazing! We are actually staying at my parent's house this week to allow our house to be shown at all times. It's been sort of a vacation which has been a lot of fun!!!

Updated pictures....FINALLY!!

This is Madilyn hanging out in her bouncer (a favorite pastime of hers) and Mikah is trying to get her to play with Feliciti's cell phone. He doesn't quite get that she is too young to play with him. Its adorable!!!


Feliciti has just started asking to hold Madilyn a lot and she is getting her 'Mommy skills'. She tries to feed her, give her a paci, and she loves to hand her a blanket. She says, "Madilyn blanket". Its so sweet!

Having our new angel in our family has really been fun and amazing to see as a mom. Mikah and Feliciti have such a great capacity to love...and they are growing up so much!!!

Dr. checkup

12 Days with Madilyn---I went to my Dr. today for a check up and I have already lost 28 pounds!!!! I am super thrilled about this and can't wait to lose the remaining few pounds I have left! Then on to Mikah's weight I am still carrying around! =) I plan on joining Weight Watchers and start walking/jogging/running in that order...until I can get a gym membership. I am getting my body back!!!!

Oh and Madilyn is doing great! She is already growing up to me- I watched her birth video last night and I could completely tell the difference in her face. She has already changed so much! Mikah and Feliciti are getting almost 100% better too! Our Ziebarth house is a happy house!

Life with Madilyn so far

I am sure some of you are wondering how life has been so far with Madilyn. She is an absolute gift from God!!! We have our hands full at times with Mikah learning how his independence fits into a structured society and Feliciti learning boundaries exist for her...so we were a little concerned with a newborn in the mix. But she is incredible! She sleeps all the time, she eats great, she poops/pees the way she is supposed to...it has been great! She is on a 3-4 hour schedule all day and has even had a one-time occurence of letting us sleep 5 and a half hours Saturday night!! We are so blessed to have her!

Mikah and Feliciti are totally infatuated with her! They ask about her all the time and wish she was with us when she is asleep...we are so thankful that the Lord has been so good to us with all three of our babies! We do lose our patience at times but what parent doesn't? We do need more sleep but that will come...and sometimes I can't wait to go back to work just so I can get some me-time!

BUT....
I am enjoying the moment with my family and praying for the Lord's strength, endurance and patience during the tough times. We are having a blast together as a family!

Madilyn Kyle Ziebarth

She is here!! We have been blessed by the Lord in so many ways but when He created our three precious babies He did some amazing work!!!

Ok so here is how it happened...last Friday 6/26 we were planning on going to Hawaiian Falls since we knew we would be home for a little while once Madilyn came. Around 9 I lost my plug and then very mild contractions started at 10:45. I still wanted to go to the water park because I promised my babies and I do not like to break promises. So we went and every 12-14 minutes I would have a mild contraction while playing in the fun toddler pool area! Haha! They weren't bad at all so I knew that she had a little while to come.

We had an appointment at 3:30 p.m. to go to the hospital anyway to get my blood drawn and check our vitals so I decided that I would see how everything was going then. The nurse took my blood and checked Madilyn's heartrate and it was relatively lower than normal. My blood pressure was a little higher than normal. So it was this combination that made my doctor give the "Go Ahead" to start inducing that night instead of the following morning. YEAH!!! We were elated and so ready to start this process and meet our darling angel!!

So the pitosin started at 8 pm (the paperwork and everything took forever!) and she came in 3 pushes at 2:17 am beautiful and amazing!!! She has truly completed our family and has been such a good baby- she already has herself on a 3-3 and a half hour schedule!!! A baby after my own heart- scheduled!! Here is a picture of our angel Madilyn Kyle Ziebarth.....

Here She Comes...Ready or Not!

The latest news on the Madilyn-home-front is this....if she does not come by this Saturday, June 27, we will be inducing her!!!! I know that the plan was to go ahead and have her come on her own but....after talking over this with my doctor and also realizing school will be starting sooner rather than later, I decided that I need my darling Madilyn to come. As it is, I will be spending the shortest amount of time with her compared to her 2 siblings: only approximately 6 weeks. Mikah had me for over 3 months and Feliciti had me for 10 weeks. If I wait until she is ready...well we all know what a great home I provide for my little ones! =)

So that's the update- we are BEYOND EXCITED to finally meet her! We are ready to fully complete our family and start to get to know the beauitiful and sweet Madilyn Kyle Ziebarth!!!

Still waiting...

Just an update...we are still patiently waiting for our newest angel Madilyn to enter into this world. I am 39 weeks pregnant today so I still have time but we are all getting anxious. Even Mikah will tell random people, "Madilyn is coming soon and she will grow big!"

Justin's last day at DBU was Friday so we are all very excited to have him home with us!!! We are taking advantage of it and we got Hawaiian Falls season passes to enjoy! He will take the month of July off with us and then start full time counseling (15-16 clients a week) in August. We are so blessed to have the opportunity to spend this time in transition all together! Praise Him who takes care of all the details for us!

The next time I post hopefully we will have to say "table for 5 please!" =)

Mikah is becoming even more of a big boy!!!

Ok so breaking news with my big boy Mikah! He has started using the potty almost twice a day now! We are realistic enough to know that with Madilyn coming very soon, that strict potty training would be a huge headache as he would probably revert back to diapers. So we started making easy ritual changes such as potty after breakfast, after lunch and before bedtime. He has started to really grasp the whole control thing and he is averaging 1-2 successful pee-pees in the potty a day!!!!! We are absolutely overjoyed since we are about to embark on life with 3 in diapers....oh my...

Please make sure to congratulate Mikah when you see him next! He is growing up so much!!

First False Alarm Ever

Last night on my way home from my parent's house, I was driving the kids along singing to "Wheels on the Bus" and other great songs having a blast with my two wonderful angels. When we got home, I noticed that my shorts felt a little damp. My first thought was "Geez was I sweating that bad?" Please keep in mind that I am continually sweating and always hot. Yuck I know.

So we go inside and I start to go through Feliciti's bedtime rituals. Diaper, pajamas, nite-nite book, prayers, and our goodnight song....and as I go through all of this my pants are feeling wetter and wetter. I am THOROUGHLY confused because I am not feeling anything going on to make it do this. So after putting her down, Mikah is using the potty like a big boy (post to come on that) and then I check to see what is going on. Without being too graphic, I wonder if my water has broken...

After putting Mikah down with all the same rituals, I go immediately online to see if this could be. Now to all of you who may be thinking, "This is your third child Traci, don't you know what it could be?" I had two forced inductions and they broke my water for me so I have no clue what this feels like/looks like etc. So all the sites I read say call your dr so I did. She said it sounded like my water had broken and to get to the hospital.

After hearing this, Justin and I realize we are so not ready with all the details of having Madilyn...our bags aren't packed, we dont know who will take the kids to Edna's in the morning, etc...so we rush around and get these details taken care of and then off we go to the hospital. (Don't call CPS on us- a neighbor came over while the kids slept)

Ok this post is getting really long so needless to say, my water did not break, I am dilated to a 1.5 and I was/am incredibly disappointed. I am so bombarded with emotions right now: frustration, disappointment, exhaustion, sadness, embarrassment, loneliness...I am so ready to just welcome my beautiful daughter Madilyn into this world and start our completed family's journey.

Please be praying for me and our family as we round out the last week and a half...

Not much to report....

Well there isn't much to say from my dr. appointment today. Vitals are good, the baby is moving....but there was no examination so we don't know about any dilation/effacement. =( But we will know next Tuesday if my prediction is correct- I think I am dilated! I've done this twice before and I am pretty sure I know what that feels like so we will see next week...

I know a lot of you are thinking TMI right now, but hey! This blog is called 'Life with the Ziebarths'!! And this is my life right now!!! Remember Justin always says, "My wife has no shame."

Love you all!

Summer has officially started!

So today started our summer. Being a teacher has so many perks- the main one being the whole entire summer off!! We kicked off our summer with a visit to Target to get some groceries and a nice long nap! We also went over to Mimi and Papas after work since Justin has school until late tonight. I tend to get a little bored over the summer so every day I have to plan at least one thing to do, hence today's Target trip.

Tomorrow I have a dr appt where we will see what kind of progress we are making towards Madilyn coming to see us! I truly am so excited to meet my new angel Madilyn Kyle. I am definitely getting incredibly uncomfortable and tired but the Lord is my Strength!!

Will update later on the appointment...

Madilyn did it!!!

So yesterday was my 36 week doctor appointment and I told the doc about how horrible Saturday night was- I literally almost went to the hospital because the pain was so unbearable! I slept for maybe 2 hours because I was so uncomfortable and hurting! Well...she put the sono wand on my belly and said, "Well I know why you were in so much pain Saturday night! Your daughter decided to move head down!!!" YEAH!!! PRAISE GOD!! OUR PRAYERS HAVE BEEN ANSWERED!!!

I am so incredibly excited and started crying right away! I am so proud of my little one for making such a hard move! I mean, she is already 18.5 inches long and probably close to 6 pounds!!!! So now we just wait....we wait for Madilyn to come into this world on her own!

What a great feeling to be proud of your unborn daughter!

And praise the Lord for His faithfulness!

We are finally joining the 21st century!

Ok so I have heard from everyone that we need to start a blog...well here I am finally doing it! We are about to get ridiculously busy with Madilyn coming in about 2 weeks but we will try to post as often as possible! I want to keep everyone updated on how fast my little ones are growing up!

Mikah is already 3 and truly becoming a big boy! He is so amazing and sometimes Justin and I look at each other and wonder where the time has gone. He has grown up so much in such a short time and we are so in love!

Feliciti is turning 2 at the end of the summer and she is our little angel. She is shy and oh so sweet! She loves her big brother so much and they play together all the time!

Madilyn is currently making a name for herself in being the only one of my 3 that is breech! I am 36 weeks along and she is still not flipped over. We will have to see what this means for the delivery but we are praying for His peace.

Justin is starting his last semester of his masters degree this summer and we couldn't be more thrilled!! He has blown me away with the ability to get his Masters of Counseling while starting our family and continuing to add to that family 3 times!! He is truly amazing! He will graduate in August and start full time interning while being a stay-at-home dad with our 3 little ones!! WOOHOO!! He has also done a lot of fishing which you can see with this huge fish he caught a couple of months back!

I am finishing up my 5th year of teaching! I can't believe it's been 5 years already! I am starting at the new Dubiski Career High School next year hopefully teaching higher levels of math which has been my dream since middle school!!! I am starting back on my Masters of Math in the fall which I am thrilled about!

We are loving life with our family...and when Madilyn comes, we will be all the more complete!!