Sleeping Beauty

She's a great snuggler! (And, yes, I adjusted her after I took this picture)

Meeting Some of the "Greats"

Evelyn got to meet her Great-Aunt Judy and her Great-Grandma Glupker when she was two and a half weeks old. Aunt Judy
Four Generations: Ben's Dad, Grandmother, Ben & Evelyn
This is pretty special to me since we no longer have four generations on either side of my family.

Grandma & Evie Kate

Just Me & My Baby Girl

My sister has the two older children today and tomorrow leaving me with Evie Kate. Life is so easy with just a newborn! We've gone shopping, ran errands, completed housework, visited the pediatrician and gone to the dentist. I'm getting lots accomplished with only my baby in my care! But I have to say . . . I miss my Owen and Aubrey!

She's Popular Around Here

Lovin' on Evie

Owen asks to hold her the moment he gets out of bed.

Evie is in this picture. You just can't see her because Owen & Aubrey are fighting over her.

LOVE

i love this girl!

"For this child I prayed, and the LORD has granted me my petition that I made to him."

I Samuel 1:27

Aubrey or Evelyn?

I thought my girls looked more alike until I did a side by side. Can you tell who is who?

Visitors

One very noticeable difference between this delivery and my other two was that we were able to have family come visit us in the hospital. When we lived in Kentucky we didn't have family around during delivery and all of our family was gone within the first week.

At one point my room was absolutely packed! It was so fun to celebrate together. Unfortunately we did not get pictures of everyone. But the following people came to see us while we were in the hospital: Ben's Mom & Dad, Owen & Aubrey, Jeff, Kim, Cole, Brenden, Brooklyn & Carson, Charlie & Amber, Ben's sister, Sarah, my Dad, Jean and my friend, Sabrina. Brenden & Cole with their new cousin. Brenden got in the hospital bed with me and we had this conversation:

Brenden: "Aunt Kelly, how did Evelyn get here?"

Me: "Well, she was in my belly and then she came out."

Brenden: "I know she was in your belly. But how did she get out of your belly?"

Me: "I think you should talk to your dad about that."

Brenden: "Why? You were there. You saw it happen."

Uncle Jeff, still in shock that he was wrong about the birth date, and Brenden
Brooklyn. Sweet Brooklyn. During her visit she asked me, "Aunt Kelly, are you going to have just three kids? Or do you think you'll have more?" I answered, "I don't know, honey. We'll take how ever many God gives us." She pointed to my belly and said, "Well, I think there is another one in there."

Carson meeting Evelyn

Proud Grandpa

Cole & Grandma

Sabrina. Needless to say I didn't make it to her house that night to sort through garage sale stuff.

Siblings

Three Glupker men adoring the new little girl in the family

Grandpa, Owen & Daddy

Aunt Sarah

Owen is always close by!

Ready to go home! Although since we didn't have the older two kids we opted to go on a mini date instead of coming straight home from the hospital. We did a little shopping and went out to lunch.

On Saturday we had a few more visitors come to our house: John R., Chris, Austin and Uncle M. We also had one of my close childhood friends come all the way from the other side of the state, Holland, MI. Shelby and her husband Lance came by with their two little girls.

Sunday we shared our little blessing with our church family. It was a great weekend.

Finally a Family of 5

Owen and Aubrey came up to the hospital Thursday morning to meet their baby sister. For Owen, it was love at first sight. He simply cannot get enough of Evelyn Kate. He wants to hold her constantly and when visitors come over he has a hard time giving her up for long periods of time. He talks to her, kisses her, lays next to her, and tells her that she's a "pretty girl" and a "nice baby." The first thing he does each morning is run into her room to see her and he wants her to be a part of our family reading time, singing time, prayer time - everything. Right after he met her he asked if we could go buy her a booster seat so she could sit at the dinner table with us. Aubrey was more interested in the hospital room than she was Evie. In fact, while Owen and I were snuggling with Evelyn together Aubrey was pushing the buttons on my bed making us rock back and forth. Now that we're home she's much more aware of the baby and likes to hold her and kiss her. She laughs hysterically any time Evelyn makes a funny noise or moves unexpectedly. Owen and Aubrey have just started fighting over Evelyn. Yesterday morning Aubrey was holding her and Owen asked for a turn. Aubrey said, "Not now, Owen. You can hold her after dinner."

Owen could not stop giggling and smiling over his little sister. He proudly announced that he now has three girls he has to protect. He takes that role very seriously.

There's no wiping that smile off his face . . . unless you ask him to give her up.

Our Family of 5: One proud Daddy, one goofy girl, one tired Mama, one chatty little boy and a precious little girl. Thank you, God. My hands are full of good things.

Choosing a Name

Doesn't my face just say it all? "Come on! We have to pick a name!"

This picture was taken about 12 hours after our baby girl was born and we still had not picked out a name. We were getting all kinds of text messages, emails and phone calls inquiring about our daughter's name. If you think 12 hours was a long time to wait, be glad we didn't have a boy!

The kids were coming to the hospital at 11:00 a.m. to meet our new baby and I really wanted the baby to be named before the big introduction. Ben and I each had a name we liked but unfortunately it was not the same name. Although I had several names on my list that I would have been happy with. Literally minutes before Owen and Aubrey arrived I finally said to Ben, "let's be biblical and cast lots." Of course I was kidding, sort of. We pulled out a quarter and quickly set up the ground rules. One toss only, not best out of three. The quarter had to land on the ground. No do overs. If it landed on heads I could pick the name, tails and Ben could. The quarter went up and landed on heads. I win! Except that as soon as I saw the look of disappointment on Ben's face I told him he could name the baby. His face lit up and he excitedly named her Evelyn. Neither one of us had a middle name so we started throwing out suggestions. We were now seconds away from the kids arriving. We went through lots of names and I finally said, "Kate." Ben LOVED it. And I do too. Evelyn Kate. It's our daughter. It's perfect. Owen calls her Evelyn Kate. Aubrey calls her Baby Kate. I call her Evie-Kate. Daddy calls her all of the above. She's our girl.