Luke 4 months old!

September 2008
Luke is growing and moving so much now!

Trip to San Diego

October 2008

What a great vacation! It seems like it had been forever, since we had been on a vacation.

And ohh, was it so great to relax, go to the beach and just enjoy being together as a family. 

Lane's sister lives out on SD and so we decided to go visit. 

We went to the beach several times and even got a visit to Legoland, which the kids loved of course.

Baby Luke Hooper is here!!

YEAH!!! Baby Luke Hooper arrived on Saturday morning at 7:56am. My water broke on Friday afternoon at 2pm and labored all night long. Then, about 6am on Saturday morning the baby's heart rate started dropping unusually with some of the contractions, a sign that something might be wrong. It is normal for the heart rate to drop some, but this was more than the doctors were comfortable. Then, about 7:15am it happened again and the doctor decided this wasn't good and it was time to go get him with an emergency c-section. So, things happened quickly after that and at 7:56am, Luke Hooper was born !!

He weighed 8 lbs 11oz and was 21 inches long! Bigger than we were expecting!! We are so thrilled and big brother Caleb and big sister Abigail are so excited to finally meet him. We came home from the hospital yesterday. We are so thankful for the blessing of this new child into our life.

Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." Matthew 19:14

The name Luke is from the New Testament in the Bible. He was a doctor, travelled with the Apostle Paul and wrote one of the Gospel books of the Bible. The name Hooper is a family name after Anna's mother's parents. We have always respected them and wanted this child to carry their name. Also, Luke's great-great grandfather is Harry Hooper a baseball Hall of Famer who played for the Boston Red Sox with Babe Ruth (Lane loves this!!). Actually, we thought about naming him Hooper Luke and actually tried it on for a few days after he ws born, but then Monday night, Lane and I decided to go with Luke Hooper.

Trusting the Lord

I have been wrestling lately with how much I should try to intervene and "make" this baby come. There are a few medical and several natural ways that can induce labor. However, I feel in some ways that it is an issue of me trusting the Lord. God can make this baby come at any second. His timing is perfect. I need to remind myself of that and know that God knows more than I do. He knows that the baby needs to develop another day or that the right doctor will be on call on the right day. I don't know those things and I have to trust that He is orchestrating those events ahead of me. I am pretty sure my doctor (whom I trust a great deal) will want to do another c-section when I reach 42 weeks overdue, which would be on or around Tuesday May 27th next week. So, my prayer has been and continues to be that this baby will come on his own before that time. God know this and so whatever happens, I will trust that that was God's answer to my prayer. I had to release these exact thoughts when I was pregnant with Abigail, who was 15 days overdue and delivered via c-section. (By the way, I shouldn't be induced with medicine like pitocin because I have had 2 previous cesareans.) So, I have been down this path before, but it is a reminder again of my faith and trust in God.

Spring Bluebonnets

Caleb's Soccer

This spring we entered the world of competive sports. Or I guess you could say, I became a "Soccer Mom." Or maybe I should more appropriately say that Lane became the "My dad is the best coach ever!" So, I learned that at the 4-5 year old level, they play 3-on-3 and there aren't many rules. Actually, the goal of the whole game is for the kids to have fun, learn how to kick the ball, and get the idea of which direction to kick the ball (ha!). It took him a few games for Caleb to warm up to the idea of how it all works.

Flying Kites

We took advantage of a windy day about 2 weeks ago to "Go fly a kite". The kids loved it and it was so great just to be outdoors and enjoy the late-spring weather. Caleb is 5 years old, Abigail is almost 3, Luke will be born four days after these pictures!

Baby Luke Update

Well, we are due to have a baby any day now. Actually, this baby boy was due last week on May 13th, 2008. Thanks for all of your prayers and we hope to have news of a new baby any day now.

Caleb's 5th Birthday

Hi friends and family!
Welcome to our family Blog. I thought it would be fun to try this out as a way to keep up with folks. Especially, as we are about to have our third child any moment now :-) I will try to put some pictures and other fun stuff along the way. enjoy!

Here are two pictures of Caleb's 5th birthday in April! The cupcake picture was from our family party and the chocolate cake picture is from his party with his school friends in our back yard. He helped me make this cake. It is a "Star Wars Lego battle scene" if you couldn't tell what those little things on top of the cake are. He set up the whole scene on the top with the bad guys on one side of the river and the good guys (Luke, Han, R2D2, etc) on the other. All the other kids loved it and kept asking to get the slice with Luke on top. His cousins Aurea, JL and Jude and Grandparents came down from Dallas for the weekend as well.

Anna