The story of Olivia Hope

Saturday, April 7, 2012

What a day!


At our MOPS Easter Egg hunt! Just us girls!!

She was chompin' at the bit to start tearing into her eggs!


My lovies!

Love this face!

At mum-mum's and pop-pop's for Easter fun!

Sneaking a jelly bean after who knows how many grams of sugar she has consumed today!!

Looking forward to church tomorrow and remembering the empty tomb!
Happy Easter!

Sunday, April 1, 2012

March

March is gone and I can't believe it! We've celebrated Gwen's fourth birthday, Olivia's second birthday, Lewis starting on solid food and ALMOST crawling and spring cleaning! Well, we didn't really celebrate the cleaning, just started it! Lots and lots of cleaning! I've been cleaning out every cupboard, bin, drawer, cubby, wiped down woodwork, washed windows and blinds and LOTS of de-dog-hairing the place! I love standing in a newly reorganized and freshly washed room and just soaking it all in! AH!

Gwen celebrated her birthday this year by having a birthday party with all of her little friends! We have never had a party other than family so I was excited to put her little "princess" celebration together! We had all her little friends dress up in princess (and two little princes) dresses and did the typical birthday activities! It was so much fun!



We didn't do too much for Olivia's birthday this year. I'm still trying to figure out what our tradition for her will be. We had our first year celebration for her last year when she turned one but of course I won't be doing all that every year. This year her birthday fell right on a trip to Lancaster so we didn't have too much time to do anything formal. We did go to the Angel Garden to light our birthday candle and sing "Happy Birthday" to her. I always enjoy talking to Gwen about her sister in heaven and welcome the questions she asks. She doesn't remember anything so I feel like we have to reexplain everything to her and how do you tell a four year old that Olivia's BODY is here and in the ground but she is actually alive in heaven! Lewis slept the whole time in his car seat but we made the most out of the time we had hanging out, saying "hi" to our other little baby friends there (our friend's children who are also there) and being all together. I didn't bake a cake because we had so much left over from Gwen's birthday just a week earlier so we went to Dunkin Donuts after ward to get a birthday donut!


Lewis IS in there!


Happy birthday, little girl!


Hanging out!

Lewis turned 7 months old yesterday! He's starting to do so many things that seem so grown up! I guess it's just his personality starting to show! He is scooting all around and getting up on all fours! He moves around but hasn't quite figured out the one foot (or knee) in front of the other method! We also started him on solid food last month! He does ok with it. I honestly thought he would suck it down but he, so far, has been kinda choosy about when he eats and when he doesn't. Oh he also got his first hair cut last month! As sad as Gwen was about it the "rat tail" is gone!!


bye bye rat tail!

It was a pretty good month!

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Sunday, January 15, 2012

Lewis-five days old


Some of you may have seen this photo already but I just love it so much I wanted to share it with you! This is L when he was just five days old! If you notice the scale shows his actual birth weight-9 pounds 15 oz! Our good friends, Kevin and Kerry High (and Zach!)of Kevin High photography have definitely spoiled us with super awesome pictures of our family! We met Kevin and Kerry when I was still pregnant with Olivia. We share a special bond with them in the fact that they too have lost a child, their son Ryan. The Highs have been great friends and very encouraging as we walk through our Olivia journey and it's been great being friends past our similar experiences too! You can find them at www.kevinhighphotography.com and if you want to see more of our family there you can choose the gallery "Baby L Fretz" and the password is "Winnie". I think you'll agree that Kevin does great work and it might just put you in the mood for a family session!
Thanks High family for being our friends!

Saturday, January 14, 2012

Ginger Kids!







Our holidays were good. We did the usual family stuff and had a great time being together. It was fun watching Gwen enjoy Christmas this year. I would say, being three years old, that this was really the first Christmas she understood. We also experienced a lot of sorrow this holiday season watching friends and family go through some devastating losses. It's so heartbreaking watching those you love go through so much grief and it also conjured up so much emotion for me by remembering everything with Olivia. Not a day goes by that I don't think about her.

Lewis is now four months old. He is so fun and really starting to express opinions and personality. He LOVES Gwen and loves to watch her do just about anything. His eyes rarely leave her! He is:

20 pounds 28 inches
giggling
rolling over
"talking"
starting to get into a sleep schedule
tolerating the car more
playing with toys
a total momma's boy
my favorite little dude ever!