Name Please...

The night before labor began, we thought we should take a picture of me being pregnant one last time. No kids were awake to hug my belly, so Erin did the honors:

Labor began around 5:30pm while we were here and shortly after I went down the sweet roller slide (these types of parks would be illegal in the states):

"Real" labor started around 11:30pm during a nap I was having. The kids were at our friends and Erin was watching a movie. We drove 200 meters to the hospital and went to triage. Slowly but surely they wheeled me to L and D. I don't think the staff believed me when I told them the baby was coming fast. I held back urges to push until Erin found the nurses and doc in the hall talking to one another. Five good pushes and

Myka Ashlin Palmer

was born!

Weight: 6lbs 13 oz

Length: 20 in

Cool Stuff: Looks like she has blue eyes; really long toes; dimples on both cheeks

Welcome to the world, lil' Myka!

Taylor's 4th Birthday

Ah, there are so many things I could say about this wonderful girl, but I'm not. I've saved those words for my journal. Let's just say I adore her and we are so lucky to have her in our family.

Landon and I decorated the home and set out gifts the night before her birthday. In the morning she opened her gifts. Her favorite was this Minnie Mouse costume.

Card from Grandma D

We went to Sunset Beach at low tide. The kids said it was kind of cold. I

don't know about you, but 83 degrees outside and the water being 80? Boy, we're spoiled.

6121D

The day our belongings arrived, it was like Christmas. Here's our place--about a month ago.

(We got rid of TONS, but they said we were 4000 lbs over weight--is that possible? I guess when we see a big chunk of money deducted from our pay check we will know for sure...)

Sterile, Old, Military Hospital

The fourth and final has arrived. Sitting in this sterile, old, military hospital room next to my brand new baby, who is sleeping in the bassinet thingy, is quite a bit different than the Cambridge Birth Center. Yesterday when I knew I'd have to deliver this baby in un-known territory ( a hospital), I was a bit apprehensive. Why not trick Erin and just plop the baby out at home? Why not run across the street to the ocean and deliver it real hippy style (I really contemplated this one)? Needless to say and without much detail, we came to the hospital and with in an hour and a half had our new baby girl. And despite all the beeps and monitors wrapped around my belly and the thingy in my arm just in case I need fluids via IV and corpsman and nurses coming in and out and being wheeled on a bed from triage to labor and delivery to postpartum (which was actually quite fun), and having to stay 24 hours because it's protocol, despite all this...the peaceful, quiet joy that comes from giving birth and seeing your baby for the first time, in any environment, is totally incomparable to anything else in this world. I love every part of it. So as I sit in this sterile, old, military hospital next to my new born, I really don't wish to be anywhere else.

Sesoko Island

We usually spend Saturdays exploring new places and they tend to be beaches. A few weekends ago we took a little trip up north to Sesoko Island. Check out the color of the water. I didn't edit these pics. Some of my favorite things about that day was hanging with our friends in paradise; Landon collecting sea life with his buddies and making a "resort" for them; Taylor wanting to keep the dead fish she found in her room because it was "so cute, like a baby;" Audra playing with shells and zooming them around like cars on the sand; watching the guys out snorkeling and the local man fishing by looking through a bucket; the awesome caves and rock formations; blue starfish and other cool fish. The only thing I didn't like was that me and the girls went to go snorkeling and got all the way out to where the water was breaking and we were called back in by the lifegaurd. We thought we heard some Japanese over the loud speaker the farther we went out, but hey, we don't speak Japanese. They were probably all thinking "Hey, if you want to live in Japan, you should learn Japanese!" (But Japanese people are too kind to think things like that).